Last month, the 192 room Sheraton Wilmington South finally opened for guests, 10 years after it's original planned opening. What happened? Well, building inspectors discovered it was 1/3 larger than approved plans. Court battles ended in bankruptcy for the developers, another developer took over, and finally Hersha Hospitality plunked down $15 million for the fully furnished. building. 

Hersha spent $24 million gutting the never-used hotel, creating a grand lobby staircase for those perfect bridal pictures. Yesterday, the New Castle County Board of Realtors held their installation of 2012 officers at the Sheraton, and we had a chance to see it in all its neutral-toned beauty.

The verdict?  I have not seen the rooms, but the meeting room on the 2nd floor overlooking the lobby had a low ceiling and a big post in the middle so that the podium was hard to see, a problem depending on where your table was. Sort of claustrophobic.  The food was OK, although this tea drinker had to be persistent requesting tea, since only coffee was set out (and not market decaf or caffeine).

Originally the older design had a spiral staircase in the lobby (what were they thinking?), so the "grand" version was nice, but I walked all around the lobby and although their was a tiny Starwood Hotel guest counter, there didn't seem to be a traditional check-in desk, just some computers. Guess they figure everyone is fine with some online system. Below, the lobby as seen from the 2nd floor. As I came in from the parking lot, I could see guests leaving the hotel, so they are attracting people--as they should, since it is just feet from the heavily travelled north-south I-95 corridor. Hope they don't have too many problems with being built in a swamp, since I did see a "high water" sign posted on the road outside the parking lot. It is right down the road from Historic Old New Castle, so at long last visitors will not have to travel far for an overnight stay.

The following three links lead to my market reports for Southern Chester County, Pennsylvania and New Castle and Kent Counties in Delaware which were all posted during the month of January, 2012.

http://actvra.in/qWs

http://actvra.in/r5G

http://actvra.in/rpl

As for the WEATHER report, although we had plenty of snow a year ago, so far only a couple of inches of icy stuff. Not nearly as pretty as last year, but then again, not as much shoveling.

Although we had some light snow in October 2011, last night brought a couple of inches of wet snow in Wilmington. It was pretty icy around 9 a.m., but by noon it had turned to a manageable icy layer with enough water under it to scoop to the side of the driveway. And my lovely South Graylyn Crest neighbor had used his snow blower earlier to do the front sidewalks of about half a dozen houses from his house to mine, so all I had to shovel was the driveway and path to my door.

Then I looked out my back window and saw this lovely sight. I had left a container with Juncus effusus (Big Twister - Twisted Rush) and alyssum for winter interest, and behold--it looked very interesting!

As was true in other local markets, New Castle County, Delaware had a surge of activity in December, 2011, but a year end compilation of figures  still shows a slow market. Although new listings were up 1.3% in December, they were down almost 13% for the year. The reason for this can be seen in the median sales price of $195,000, which was down 8% for 2011 overall.

The times are also reflected in days on the market, which for the year went up 21.5% from the previous year, from 79 to 96 days on the market.  These figures are saying to sellers that for the most part, your home will probably be on the market more than 90 days, and you will get around 8% less than last year. There are exceptions, of course, depending on neighborhood and condition of a property. And remember, don't overimprove your property, because appraisers are going to be comparing your home to similar homes which may not have designer fixtures or energy saving features.

If you have questions about getting your home ready to market, call Carolyn Roland.

Still serving the Real Estate needs of Kent and New Castle Counties in Delaware, and Southern Chester County in Pennsylvania, for 25 years.
CAROLYN ROLAND, GRI CRS

Once a year, the Kennett Amateur Theatrical Society (KATS) presents "a pantomime in the British tradition." This means the "dame" is played by a man, the "principal boy" is played by a young woman, and a friendly animal or two are played by, in this case, two girls playing the front and back of a cow.

This is the eleventh year of this madness, begun by imports from England who also imported silly songs, silly jokes, and lots of audience participation. I love to go to the Saturday matinee performance (there is also one Friday night and Saturday night) where there are lots of children in the audience. This year, one of my friends brought eight year old twin grandchildren, and we sat in the front row. What a hoot! The kids loved it, especially Frankie, who said it was the best play he had ever seen!

I downloaded a song near the end of the performance to the tune of Gilbert & Sullivan's "Model of a Modern Major General" from The Pirates of Panzance. See for yourself!

JANUARY      APRIL        JULY

FRIDAY      FRIDAY      FRIDAY

13                   13              13       

 Wait--are we beginning to see a pattern here? For the first time since the early 1980’s, there will be a Friday the 13th (Like Today!) in January, April and July during a leap year. And to top it all off, they will all be 13 weeks apart.

But you know what? I’m going to keep working and calling my contacts, because I don’t want them to think I have fallen into a black hole of some sort.

We make our own luck, after all. Four-leaf clovers need not apply.

Still serving the Real Estate needs of Kent and New Castle Counties in Delaware, and Southern Chester County in Pennsylvania. No luck involved, just hard work and experience.
CAROLYN ROLAND, GRI CRS

Once considered eligible for the Natiional Register of Historic Places, Brandywine Hundred's Murphy House was demolished yesterday. The Nemours Foundation, owners of the children's hospital across the road, had agreed to restore the Murphy House . Those who fought to preserve the build­ing said they felt double-crossed by the state it trusted to enforce deed restrictions im­posed in 2008 when it sold the acre at 1601 Rockland Road to Nemours for $10 and a promise to preserve the farmhouse.

A deed restriction on the property was recently lifted by the State, and although Delaware Greenways proposed using the house as a trailhead for a bike program, the Nemours Foundation chose to take advantage of the lifting of restrictions and turn a deaf ear to the Greenways proposal. An earlier offer by Nemours to contribute $50,000 towards moving the house found no takers, to no one's surprise. Nemours had paid $10 for the house originally as part of a package to create parkland and trails in the area to satisfy nearby Astra Zeneca, a large pharmaceutical company when they were looking for a facility to expand their business.

So as local preservationist James Hanby, Sr., has noted, "The Murphy House represents the 99%, it is the story of the rest of us--a small family home... The Nemours Mansion (across the road and on the grounds of the children's hospital) clearly represents the 1%-- the home base of a titan of industry and the center of an empire that spanned thousands of acres of land both here and in Florida. The difference is this, A.I. DuPont cared about the common man, he understood that with his great wealth came with great responsibility. Here is a man who wrote personal checks to many senior folks on a monthly basis who were retired and had nothing in the days before Social Security. This and many other like actions tell me that Mr. DuPont was a man of honor who would have seen the importance of saving and restoring this humble farm house as much or more then he would have consented to spend $38,000,000 restoring his home. Especially if he had gotten it based on agreeing to restore it. His word was his bond. He believed in the people who worked for him and how they lived meant something to him. He could have very clearly removed this house from it's place near his mansion grounds had he thought it had no purpose or importance."

Thanks to Mr. Hanby for these photos.

Year-to-date (December 2011), close to one in four listings in New Castle County closed as a short sale or bank-owned property, and one in three in Kent County.  Above, we see the figures for December alone, and below we see the figures for  2011 as a whole. The biggest difference between New Castle and Kent Counties is that 15.5% of REO or Bank-Owned properties settled in NCCO, while 22.6% closed in Kent.  Short sale figures are almost identical, although the more populous northern county handled almost four times as many individual properties. .

Your resource for older homes in Delaware and Southern Chester County, Pennsylvania.

Carolyn Roland, GRI, CRS

This is a good addition to the statistics posted in my regular Market Report section. Often we read about "absorption rate" but find it hard to put a finger on without concrete examples. See http://actvra.in/qWs for average days on the market before sale, which will give you the "absorption rate".

This article explains more.

Carolyn

If you read my earlier blog, http://actvra.in/pbP  you know that preliminary measurement and clean out was being done on the sewer laterals in Brandywine Hundred and in particular,  South Graylyn Crest to prepare them for lining, per an EPA mandate. Rainwater and sewage were mixing and causing sewage to flow untreated into rivers. Not Good.  So New Castle County set about lining main lines and laterals into houses to prevent this leakage and overflow.

Today was the day that workers Dave (the CCTV cameraman) and Octavio came to finish the job on my lateral (they still have a lot more houses to do in South Graylyn, then they move to North Graylyn Crest).

Here you see Dave checking the video screen to see how the lining is being inserted, then Octavio watches as Dave adjusts the camera feed.  Below, you can see the steam when heat is applied to the lining which is sealing the liner. The sample piece of liner I saw at an earlier meeting looked like white felt. I could see a seam in the CCTV view, and Dave said it is sewn together, then taped along the length of the liner. Snug as a bug in a rug, I would say! Thanks, Team!