SPF 8,000

It's 5:00 somewhere, thankfully right now that place is Emerald Isle. My family is down for a week and right now we're awaiting some house guests coming over for cocktails & hors d'oeuvres. The weather has been great for us this week and I've taken on a bright shade of red. SPF 6 was a bold move for my first full day of sun.

Duty has called and I have to return back to Raleigh for work tomorrow unfortunately. I shouldn't complain , it's nice to have so many clients and to be this busy right now. I turn right back around and head to Tampa for a bachelor party on Friday. That kicks off a 2-month spree of one wedding after another. Throw in a trip I'm taking with JoBeth to St.Thomas in August and it makes for lots of traveling but lots of good times ahead.

The recession seems to have done most of it's damage on the real estate market. The # of sales around the country are picking back up although sale prices still seem to be down. In some markets these prices are picking back up quickly. I am skeptical of anything that happens quickly in a real estate market. The Triangle was slower to react to the slump and I see a benefit to it rising at the same pace.

While the # of sales in the Triangle is down about 14%, the average sales price is only down about 9% from the last year. This is a good sign homes are holding their values a little better than other areas. These low interest rates coupled with the valuable tax credit available to first time buyers should keep our local market headed in the right direction. Don't forget, only 124 days left to get your $8,000 tax credit.

Well I'm posting on Twitter now, you can follow me @JohnnyWehmann. It seems like just yesterday I was refusing to join Facebook, my how times change.

Well that cocktail hour is sneaking up here so I better wrap up. Here's a quick look at some of the fun my family has been having here at the beach. My nieces & nephew are at a great age right now and keep their Uncle Johnny quite busy. Thanks for reading - Adios!

Kelly & Wyatt after a go-kart ride, he definitely thought he was driving!

Carrie & Lily floating in the surf

Giving Wyatt some surfing lessons

All Aboard the Gravy Boat

I'm down at Emerald Isle now having gotten a jump on my Thanksgiving break. We have a whole lot of family down for the week and a house that accommodates. We've been doing some boating & fishing so far but I can't seem to get a fish on the end of my line. It's kind of nice that things are slow with work right now. Every family beach trip I can remember has involved me scrambling to find a fax machine and impromptu trips back home to get a contract signed.

Since I'm on vacation, my blog will take a little vacation from the normal real estate scoop as well. The current market combine with this time of year doesn't leave much to be discussed. For those waiting on the market to hit bottom, well your time may be up around here. The rates today hit an incredibly low 5.25%. I for one am looking forward to a promising 2009 market. It should be interesting competing with my Dad this coming year too, who's now licenced and ready to sell.

The house we are staying in is called "One in a Million", which it really feels like. It's on the channel right next to the inlet, making for some good boating and hopefully more successful fishing. I'm pretty bummed about the heated pool out back, it's not working and Mr. Fix It from the rental office can't seem to get it going. I've been planning on spending half my week in that thing. There is a hot tub that will have to make due, although my sisters were laughing so hard in there earlier I'm not so sure it's safe to get in anymore.

It's been a blast having my nieces & nephews around here to entertain. During low tide we have all this beach to go play on right next to the house. My sister took this picture while we were out there yesterday.

Back in Chapel Hill last week, there wasn't a moment when I didn't have a Turkey lunch or dinner to attend. Whoever said there is no such thing as a free lunch obviously never sold real estate. I did find a break to volunteer with the Fix-A-Home project put on by the Chapel Hill Board of Realtors. The homeowner couldn't of been a sweeter old lady who showed her appreciation by the expression on her face every moment we were there. She did have a dog penned up in the smallest cage ever out back, I wish we could of spent half the day fencing in her back yard for it.

I hope you all have a great Thanksgiving. If your hitting the road, Travel safe. And if you get to choose pick fried turkey over baked. Mmmm I can taste it now.

Fore!

Hope everyone is doing well. It's time to get back to work for me. I've had the benefit of being able to visit the beach the past couple weekends; it's so hard to get in the car and leave on Sundays. I'm usually with clients on the weekends so it's nice to get some time for these things. This past weekend I was down in Myrtle Beach with a group of friends and I spent Memorial Day weekend down at Topsail Island. Talk about two different places.






We had perfect weather for golf this past weekend. The squirrels at this course were especially friendly, this guy rode in our cart for the back 9. I've played quite a bit of golf lately, I hit an eagle a few weeks back and thought I was on my way to being a decent golfer. I proved to myself this weekend that I was mistaken.

We had our company golf tournament not too long ago and it was a blast. There were plenty of trophies given out, but none to our foursome. All the proceeds for this event went towards MS.

So here is the new place, a good size bigger than the old cottage. I've got a lot of work along with a lot of moving to do this week. We got the truck unpacked on Wednesday but took off for the weekend so the place is still a mess. It doesn't quite feel like I moved yet, I've barely spent anytime there so far. I will say it was nice to go 1 minute up the road for Char-Grill burgers & shakes the other night, food doesn't come much better than that.

Up until now, I've spent plenty of time in Raleigh but this is my first time living here. I'm excited to start spreading out my business. I'm going to remain based out of the Chapel Hill office for the time being. I really like the people there, and we have 13 other Fonville Morisey offices I can use. I'll have to tour some of the other offices soon and see which one I'd like to make my regular stop. My goal for the time being is to learn a little more about the Raleigh market, and just how to get from place to place for that matter.

I wanted to also give a quick mention to my new roommate and attorney at law Rob Hale. I had a closing scheduled with him last week and the lender botched things beyond belief. We thought the closing was never going to occur, but Rob got us in his office last minute and made it happen. It was the type of service I couldn't have gotten anywhere else, so he'll be getting a lot more of my business in the future.

Oh, almost forgot, I'm at the Kiosk today. Maybe it's just a slow day, but I'm pretty sure this was a waste of time for me. No one even seemed to approach the darn kiosk, oh well.