Housing Building Permits Down Last Year

LOUDOUN, Va. - A key indicator of the health of the local housing market took another downward turn as the number of residential building permits issued in Loudoun County last year dropped slightly from 2006.

Loudoun's Department of Building and Development handed out 2,983 housing building permits to contractors in 2007 -- 3 percent less than those issued in 2006 and more than 40 percent off the soaring numbers given out during the housing heyday of three and four years ago.

In 2004, the county issued 6,593 such permits, according to the Loudoun County Department of Economic Development, and 5,065 in 2005, two strong building years when Loudoun jettisoned to national prominence as one of the fastest-growing jurisdictions in the country. Last year marks the third year in a row residential building permits, which foreshadow future home construction, sank in Loudoun.

Of the permits issued last year, 53 percent were for construction of single-family homes, 36 percent were for town houses and 10 percent were for apartments. The portion for town houses was the highest since 2000.

Loudoun's building industry, though, did fare better in 2007 than it did in other parts of the country. Nationwide, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, localities issued 34 percent fewer residential building permits in December than they did 12 months prior.

"We don't expect the new homes market in Loudoun County to show much change until the second half -- at the soonest -- of this year," said economist Stephen Fuller, who is director of the George Mason University Center for Regional Analysis, "but more likely a year from now."

The problem in Loudoun, like in the region's other outer suburbs, Fuller added, is that new homes face heavy competition from a sea of existing homes still on the market.

According to data kept by the Dulles Area Association of Realtors, 3,212 homes were for sale in Loudoun at the end of December, up from 2,904 a year earlier and 2,553 in December 2005. The median sale price last month was about $474,000 -- $40,000 below 2006's figure.

"Obviously, it was slow last year," said Jeanette Newton, DAAR's chief executive officer. "Slow, but steady."

Like Fuller, she said DAAR is predicting an upward turn in the local housing market by late this year or spring 2009.

"I'm optimistic that we already hit rock bottom," she said. "New homes are probably doing worse. But we're on Sycolin Road, and there are new town houses over here that are being occupied as soon as they are built. So there is a market for the right price. What that price is, I don't know."

To pick up his sales, real estate blogger and agent Danilo Bogdanovic, with Sterling's Market Advantage Real Estate, said he has been targeting investors, who are snatching up deals in the strong foreclosure market in eastern Loudoun, which he expects to increase in 2008.

"It's aways a good time to be a Realtor," he said, when asked for his assessment of the industry. "If you're smart, you will adjust to the market. [Agents] that don't are going to hate '08 and are going to quit."

Contact the reporter at jjacks@timespapers.com

(Copyright 2008 Loudoun Times-Mirror. All rights reserved.)