Anonymous wrote:Just looking at the appreciation forecasts for Arlington and Fairfax and feeling very depressed. If you had told me 15 years ago that houses would be selling for over 1M in Falls Church I would have never believed it. Our decision to move to Montgomery County over Falls Church or Arlington has probably cost us 600K-800K in lost opportunity equity. We were really on the fence at the time but thought that there was more room for appreciation in Montgomery County.
Is there any chance that things will flip around or will Montgomery County be stagnant or dropping for another 10 years?
Montgomery County is undervalued now because most of the investors are chasing the Amazon hype. There are still a lot of deals to be had close to Metro stations that are near the Beltway. You can still buy SFHs near Forest Glen for under $500,000. That’s a steal for being a 20 minute Metro ride from DC, which is still the main economic driver in the area and always will be despite what VA boosters will tell you. NoVA prices can only go up so far, especially in bad school districts like South Arlington and Alexandria. Houses zoned for TC Williams will not get that far over houses zoned for Einstein, for example, when Einstein is a 5/10 to TC’s 2/10.
The Purple Line is a game changer as well. Let’s revisit this thread when it opens in 2-3 years. Anything near a Purple Line station between Silver Spring and Bethesda is a great buy.
Regardless of what happens, worst case scenario is that close in MoCo appreciates at a slower pace than DC or Arlington but still outpaces the rest of the nation. People need a place to live and prices are going to be SF levels around here in 5-10 years. Anywhere near public transit is a good buy, no matter what county.