Greg Broderick, Broker
Bend, Oregon 97701
1.800.689.2363
greg@BendRealEstate.com
Bend Oregon Real Estate / Homes
Booming Bend Oregon
Jan 25th 2007
BEND. OREGON
From
The Economist print edition
Prosperity comes to the mountains DURING the property frenzy of
2004 to early last year, cities such as Miami and San Francisco
got most of the attention. But no housing market was more
overheated than that of Bend, Oregon, a town of 67,000 built on
a high plateau covered in sag ebrush, juniper and pine trees.
From September 2005 to September 2006, home prices in Bend
leaped 30.4%, the highest rate in the country, according to the
Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, which regulates
the government-sponsored lenders Fannie Mae and Freddie
Mac.
Why the increase? Bend's appealingly dry climate (it lies east
of the Cascade Mountains, which catch most of the rain clouds
sweeping in from the Pacific), its small-town feel and its mix
of leisure activities (skiing, golf, tennis, mountain-biking)
have made it a magnet for California residents fed up with
traffic. Bend's median home price of $350,000 is still a
bargain compared with price-tags in the Golden State of
$550,000 and more. Baby boomers snapping up second homes also
added to the land rush, as did refugees from larger, wetter
Pacific north-west cities such as Portland and Seattle.
Bend is also economically vibrant. I t typifies the changes
seen in many western towns that once were sleepy backwaters
based on mining or timber. As recently as 1980, it had a
population of only 20,000. The end of Bend's logging industry
during the 1980s, killed by high costs and environmental
restrictions, meant the loss of a particular western culture.
But it also sparked the beginning of Bend's new prosperity.
Logging's demise meant that the forests wreathing the mountains
and lakes around Bend are likely to stay the same for many
years. As towns such as Missoula, Montana, and Sun Valley,
Idaho, have also found, trees are more valuable standing than
chopped down for lumber, says Nina Chambers, a researcher with
a think-tank called the Sonoran Institute.
Why? Because fabulous scenery attracts people with fabulous
amounts of money. Outside Bend, residents and tourists fish,
hike, bicycle, mountain climb, ride snow-machines, and ski in
beautiful forests of Ponderosa pine. Golfers on the area's many
courses admire grand panoramas from each tee. In turn, those
same people have helped make Bend's Old Mill District, once the
site of one Of the West's biggest sawmills, the city's hottest
retail and office development. The brick powerhouse building
that supplied electricity to the mill now houses a big shop
where Bend's army of climbers, skiers and mountain bikers stock
up on the latest gear.
In some areas all this translates into a city full of ageing
but well-off geezers. Not in Bend. At the St Charles Medical
Centre, the hospital's CEO, Jim Diegel, frets that his
maternity unit, now being expanded, will be at capacity the
minute it's finished. Bend's school district is bulging too,
with enrolment jumping 58% in the past decade, and 1,100 new
students in the past year alone. That bodes well for the city:
a large population of relatively young adults means thousands
of children who will eventually want to create their own jobs
and wealth in Bend.
For more information on BEND OREGON REAl
ESTATE -
HOMES, call Greg Broderick toll
free at 1-800-689-2363 or e-mail at greg@BendRealEstate.com
or Visit www.BendRealEstate.com
.