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Homewood Hills is considered an older executive home sub-division nestled in a park like setting of mature trees and streams. Most homes sit on one acre lots and the average home is 1800 sq. feet. There are homeowners who have lived here for over forty years, and naturally they are aging and passing away. I know for a fact that when someone dies in this sub-division, the heirs sell off the property for next to nothing just to get rid of the home and enable them to settle the estate quickly. Realtors who represent either local investors, or are investors themselves are grabbing them up at an incredible rate so that they can either flip them for a quick profit at a later date, pad their portfolios, or rent them out to a bunch of UGA students.

I bought my 3,000 sq ft. house "By Owner" seventeen years ago for $81,900. We refinanced for twenty years at 4.5% fixed loan ten years ago, and it was valued at $145,000 back then. However, just let me try and list it with a local agent and I will find that prices in Homewood Hills have been artificially kept low. My home has be completely upgraded with new ceramic tile, hardwood flooring throughout, three brand new marble bathrooms, a granite and stainless steel kitchen, a brand new air conditioning system, and a complete re-landscaping design of my one acre lot.

If you would like a comparison, just a mile up Prince Avenue is a neighborhood called Boulevard. It is sandwiched between two extremely low income family neighborhoods full of crack-heads, and a recent influx of immigrants. However, the Boulevard area demands prices in the $300,000 price range on average, and most of these homes need a lot or even total renovation. I looked at the Boulevard area when I first came to Athens, and prices were lower on average than Homewood Hills at the time.

It just does not make any sense to me that a beautiful neighborhood like Homewood Hills is not bringing in the same price of Scummy Boulevard. You couldn't pay me to live there.

I have thought hard about his situation, and I have decided to sit here in Homewood Hills until it is paid off (got about 7 yrs left on my mortgage) and then sell it "By Owner" at a fair and decent price with a fair interest rate, and become a full time RVer. It would seem that even if I can't sell at what it is realistically worth at least I will be making thousands of dollars in interest during the holding of the note, and that should make up for the low selling price within eight years of the loan unless it defaults in which case I still own property outright, and I will rent it out to students like the realtors are doing. - Thu Aug 7 2008, 11:15