Home sales fall in Frankfort, Ky., but could gallop back
— -- Though it's the state capital of Kentucky, Frankfort is a small city. Subtle changes can thus have a big effect on monthly home-sales data.
The 9% increase in existing home sales in December — just three more homes sold than in December 2006 — could have been a result simply of November's gubernatorial election, which brought in Gov. Steve Beshear, says Judy Craft, president of the Lexington-Bluegrass Association of Realtors.
For all of 2007, sales of existing homes were down about 10%, Craft says, while sales of newly built homes were down more — nearly 23%.
The median price for an existing single-family home edged up 1.4% last year, nowhere near the 23% increase reported for December.
Franklin County, which includes Frankfort, has a population of about 48,000, many of them employees with stable jobs in the government or at the University of Kentucky in Lexington.
But Craft says she expects the area's real estate market (particularly commercial property), which didn't see much of a run-up during the national real estate boom, to get a big kick from preparations and hosting of the All-Tech FEI World Equestrian Games. The games will be held in 2010 for the first time in the USA, in nearby Lexington, about 20 miles west of Frankfort.
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