A Bastion of Growth in a Down Market

From the Baltimore Sun

Property values in Baltimore are rising faster than anywhere else in Maryland, according to state officials who were to mail more than 730,000 assessment notices this week.

While appraisals were nearly flat statewide for property overall - and even dipped in the more prosperous suburbs - values for homes in the third of Baltimore that will receive the notices rose 21.4 percent since their last assessment in 2005.

State assessors said home values rose 9.7 percent in eastern Baltimore County, 5 percent along the U.S. 40 corridor in Harford County, and 2 percent in the reassessed area of Carroll County. Home values dropped 4.2 percent in Anne Arundel, 7 percent in Howard and 16.3 percent in Montgomery County.

State assessment officials said that higher demand for relatively low-priced houses has driven average values up in some areas.

"Most of the increase you're looking at is in moderately priced properties," said Owen C. Charles, assessment supervisor for Baltimore. A house in South Baltimore that might have sold for $75,000 in 2005 can cost $150,000 now, he said, while decreases in prosperous Howard or Montgomery counties reflect larger drops for higher-priced homes.

Daraius Irani, director of applied economics at RESI, the economic forecasting arm of Towson University, said the new figures show that the Baltimore area has some stability.

"It doesn't mean you go out and leverage yourself to the hilt to buy a home, but it shows there is a strong point in our local economy," Irani said.Last year, assessed values were up an average of 25 percent through a swath of Baltimore's midsection. The city's new assessment area includes South Baltimore and some waterfront areas such as Fells Point.