An hour outside of Houston lies Lake Conroe, a submarket where home sales activity and prices remained relatively unchanged during a recent 24-month period.
Spanning October 2014 to September 2015, a total of 1,580 homes sold, a 2.1 percent increase from the previous 12-month period. At the same time, the average sales price of a home dropped by 1.9 percent, to $$285,019, according to the Houston Association of Realtors.
Amy Smythe-Harris with Urban Provision Realtors, acknowledged that a small price dip has recently occurred, but also noted that rapid appreciation is uncommon.
Lake Conroe can be described as a second home market, but not in the sense that it’s a destination market. To the southeast the city of Conroe, a separate submarket, surrounds Lake Conroe.
“It’s cheap to buy and you can have a boat,” Smythe-Harris said, adding a number of buyers are empty nesters that are boaters or golfers.
Because homes don’t appreciate rapidly, those who sell are typically doing so because they no longer need a second home or want to be near grandkids.
