Realtors: BRAC may be Boosting Local Real Estate Market

Realtors have been bracing themselves for what impact the federal Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) program may have on the local real estate market.

Realtors are seeing a slight increase in activity, but it is not clear if this is the normal annual uptick in real estate activity that comes with spring, or if BRAC is boosting the market.

Jacqueline Nunez of Exit Realty in Lortonn said she has seen an increase in people interested in renting or buying residential properties in and around Lorton. The number of listings is also up.

Thousands more people will be working at Fort Belvoir by the end of this year.

Personnel are migrating to Ft. Belvoir from the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency headquarters in Maryland at a rate of 300 people per week. In addition to NGA staff, thousands of government contractors and military personnel will move their offices to Fort Belvoir later this year, and the new hospital will draw even more people when it opens this this summer.

“What kind of mitigates the influx of new people is the excessive amount of traffic we’re going to have on Route 1,” said Rachel Carter of Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage. “That may make part of the decision for people when they discover the increased traffic when the new hospital replaces Walter Reed.”

“The contractors will probably come in and buy,” said Carter. “They’re generally big-paying jobs, so they’re buying $500,000-plus homes, and so that’s a good boost in the arm for the whole area.”

Both Carter and Nunez agree: If a house is in a desirable neighborhood it is more likely to sell quickly.

Carter said, “If a house is in a desirable neighborhood and is priced well, they’re going under contract really quickly because there are so many buyers out there.”

The following are the number of new listings on by month for the first quarter of 2008 to this year. The statistics are for ZIP code 22309, the Mount Vernon area.