Frederick, MD

[Jo Ann Meyer Stratton]

Any one on the forum complete appraisal assignments in Frederick? My daughter is thinking of moving back to Arizona and would be listing her home for sale. She has a brick home with full basement on an acre lot. They bought it about five years ago as a REO property and have made lots of improvement since then. They have finished off half of the basement into a bedroom, bath and family room. Originally the home was three bedroom, a wall was removed between two bedrooms making a big bedroom. They have replaced the wall and it is now back to a three bedroom house. My question is; would installing new dual pane windows help the final sales price? Would having installation of dual pane windows offered help the marketing of the property? Or would they be further ahead forgetting about new windows?

 

[McMurphy]

Jo Ann,

In addition to being an appraiser in DC, MD, and VA (20+ years)I am also a RE Broker in Maryland.

Yes, I know Frederick well.

PM me if you wish.

 

[RSW]

I have a sister that lives in Frederick, MD. They had a large house built about 10 years ago. There was a moratorium on new homes being built which caused property values to jump drastically. I don't know if they still have a moratorium on new construction or not. You might want to check into that.

 

[McMurphy]

I did a new home construction appraisal a couple of months ago off Route 15/26 near the Wegmans.

Frederick was having water issues, not as bad as California but there was concern, a few years ago.

A proposal was made to draw water from the Potomac River down Point of Rocks way.

Frederick is "rebounding" as it were. Not like 2000-2006/7. But construction activity is occurring mainly for people from Montgomery County looking for cheaper housing who take the MARC train to DC, or carpool, or drive to Shady Grove and take the Red Line Metrorail..

One of these decades "rail" will probably be built along the 270 median as 270 is basically a parking lot from Frederick through the DC Beltway during rush hours. I schedule appraisals after 10AM and before 3:00PM.

 

[Jo Ann Meyer Stratton]

Thank you every one, I will be contacting some one in the near future. The home was built in the late 1950s or early 1960s. Living room, eat in kitchen, one bath, three bedrooms on the main floor, which has hardwood floors, fireplace in living room. Half of the basement is family room with a second fireplace, one bedroom, one bath. The other half is a work shop with exterior stairs and and an open space with laundry, mechanical systems and interior stairway. When they bought the property the unfinished half was one big room, but a wall with door was put in to create a workshop. They had the basement water proofed with french drains and special coating (cost them over $10,000), renovated both baths and kitchen, new paint, screened in rear porch, enlarged concrete patio in front with bushes to hide from street, etc. Her husband hasn't been working for about 18 months and he has been constantly renovating things since. The dual pane windows were going to be the next project and I am recommending they hold off on the windows, so she wouldn't have to come to Phoenix while he stays there installing windows and waiting for the house to sell, house payment in Maryland and rent in Phoenix at the same time would get expensive. Of course I am attempting to find the quickest way to get her back to Arizona. She has been in Seattle, Las Vegas and Maryland since 1997 and the whole family (including her) wants her closer to home. Our oldest grandson (her oldest nephew) died 02/03/2015 which has made the distance apart even harder to deal with.

 

[TJSum]

I doubt they would recoup the cost of the new windows unless the current windows were so old that they had functional or severe energy efficiency issues. It depends how bad the current windows are.

 

[Mike Kennedy]

I doubt they would recoup the cost of the new windows unless the current windows were so old that they had functional or severe energy efficiency issues. It depends how bad the current windows are.

Seconded.