Neighborhood boundaries, description and market conditions:
Located in the hills in a remote area above Covelo about 8 road miles southeast of the business and primary residential district. This is an area of large tracts of agricultural and range lands with the exception of a single section, 1 mile by 1 mile which has been subdivided into 10 acre parcels. This subdivision is commonly referred to as Chicken Ridge. Boundaries for rural properties are not distinct and in this case include the entire Round Valley region. See attached maps and comments below. Homes and properties vary widely and include farms and ranches and modest homes and manufactured or mobile homes on small lots.
Covelo is an isolated, rural ranching and farming community located in central Mendocino County with a population of about 2,200. Limited local employment in the agricultural, social service and education industry. Recently a new, but small casino was completed near the town center offering some additional employment opportunities. Many residents are retired, work their farms and ranches, receive public assistance or commute to employment in the Willts and Ukiah areas, 45 minutes to 1 hour south. The main commuting corridor through Mendocino County is Highway 101 and Covelo is accessed via Highway 162, a 29 mile+- paved, two-lane winding roadway along a branch of the Eel River. Small local convenience and grocery market, public elementary and high school, fuel service and medical clinic. Nearest major services, shopping and hospital located in Willits. The large Round Valley Native American reservation is located north of the subject and about half of the residents in Covelo are Native Americans
Market conditions:
The market remains slow in most areas of Mendocino County with some areas more affected by adverse conditions than others. Most measurable declines in property pricing and increases in unsold inventory appear to be occuring in the more densley developed and populated areas such as the incoporated cities of Ukiah, Willits and Fort Bragg. In the rural areas of the county it is difficult to reliably measure pricing trends due to limited sales and lack of conformity between properties. In general, the available data indicates that overall price may have declined slightly over the last 12 months but exposure time has increased signicantly. Covelo is a remote region, isolated by geography and only one road in and out of the area. Property pricing here is among the lowest in the county and there is very little market activity so statistical market trend analysis is less reliable. Over the last three years there have been 10 to 15 closed sales per year and the median price has ranged from a low of $242,000 to a high of $320,000. At this time the median is $277,000. However, exposure time has increased from about 51 days in 2005/2006 to about 168 days at this time. There have been only 3 closed sales in 2008, year to date and there are about 17 active listings. Typical supply of active listings at any given time has been about 8 to 10 listings. My conclusion is that while there is no documented trend of decline in property pricing in the Covelo market there is also too little recent activity to measure. The increase in active listings and days on market would indicate that if a property owner had to sell within a reasonable amount of exposure time (90-120 days) a discount in the offering price would be expected. For other rural areas of the county where a pricing trends can measured, prices have declined by about 10% over the last 12 months. It is reasonable to assume a similar trend in Covelo.
