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A year ago, it seemed as though Asheville would manage to escape the national real estate crisis.
"The market started falling apart every place else, and we were just chugging right along," says Tom Tveidt, director of research at the Asheville Area Chamber of Commerce. But this year — belatedly but unmistakably — the housing slump struck the Asheville area. Though home prices haven't fallen drastically, sales have. The primary cause has been a drop-off in out-of-state buyers. "We're a destination market," says Terry Horner, president of the Asheville Board of Realtors. "It's a desirable place to live." Several areas of the country, especially in Florida, have served as what Horner describes as feeders for Asheville's real estate. Those areas include retirees who live in Florida part of the year and head north to Asheville to escape the tropical summer heat, he says. Some others who are able to work from home have moved to the Asheville area to enjoy a scenic mountain getaway. But after the real estate booms in other states crumbled, they eventually helped dry up Asheville's home sales. In addition, local families have grown more reluctant to buy first homes or to move up to bigger homes because of higher gas prices and economic worries. Still, unlike in many other areas, Asheville's real estate slowdown hasn't been compounded by huge job losses or waves of foreclosures. Last year, tourism was the No. 1 industry, Tveidt says. Among the attractions are the scenic Blue Ridge Parkway and the Biltmore House, the largest privately owned home in the country. Though the area has lost many textile and manufacturing jobs over the past 15 years, they've been replaced by others in the health care field, the fastest-growing industry in the Asheville area, Tveidt says. Numerous U.S. housing markets have experienced overbuilding and speculation that fueled sharp price appreciation. That hasn't happened in Asheville. In part because the area is so rocky and mountainous, home developers haven't been able to widely expand into new areas. "We've held our own," Horner says, "and consequently, we've not seen the big depression and dip in prices when the market slowed down." Once the economy starts to improve in other parts of the country, Horner predicts that home buyers will return to Asheville.
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