© 2008 Robert Stockdale Photography, All Rights Reserved.

This week Neighborhood of the Week heads to the center of the city to explore an area it’s shied away from until now - Downtown Knoxville.

The main reason I’ve not covered downtown condos and lofts until now is that it’s a fairly daunting task. Not only is there a good bit of history and intrigue surrounding all of those building and developments, but there are also just an awful lot of them: roughly 80 active listings on the north side of the river in over 14 different developments. I’ve simply been torn about whether to try and feature them each separately or to just lump them together somehow. That is until tonight.

© 2008 Robert Stockdale Photography, All Rights Reserved.

Tonight I was in the Sunsphere - for the first time since ‘82 no less - talking to some folks about the general state of the Knoxville real estate market when the conversation turned to downtown and how it’s faring through all of this. Was it doing better than the rest of town? Worse? And how much are all those places selling for anyway? Can anyone actually afford to live there?

And that’s when I thought to myself, “Self, why not just give your friendly AAKT readers a general overview of how the downtown condo scene is doing and then worry about breaking each development down individually later?”

© 2008 Robert Stockdale Photography, All Rights Reserved.

So that’s what this week’s NOTW is all about - giving you guys a rough idea of  what’s selling - and what’s not selling - in downtown K-Town. My plan is to go back and cover individual developments in the very near future, so if any of you live somewhere in the downtown area you think is worth featuring here, please give me a shout. I’d love to have some juicy insider info to pass along.

© 2008 Robert Stockdale Photography, All Rights Reserved.

So without further ado, here’s downtown Knoxville by the numbers -

Downtown Knoxville Condos/Lofts*

Current On-Market Listings -82
Average Asking Price: $347,285
Median Asking Price: $319,950
Average Sq Footage: 1459
Average Asking Price Per Sq Ft: $238

Most Expensive: $1,250,000 (3 BR, 3 BA, 3400+ sq ft Penthouse in The Holston building)
Least Expensive: $163,460 (1 BR, 1 BA, 700+ sq ft in The Commerce Lofts)
Middle of the Road: $320,000 (2 BR, 1 1/2 BA, 1800+ sq ft in The Lerner Lofts)

Current Pending Sales -13*
Average Asking Price: $254,355
Median Asking Price:$308,925
*10 of the currently 13 pending sales are in The Commerce Lofts and many were put into pending over 5 months ago, so I’m not sure what the real status of these is.

Closed Sales - Q3 2007 - 9
Average Asking Price - $273,744
Average Sales Price - $267,656
Average Closed Price Per Sq Ft - $183
Median Sales Price - $208,000
Average Days on Market - 137

Closed Sales - Q3 2008 - 7
Average Asking Price - $315,243
Average Sales Price - $299,436
Average Closed Price Per Sq Ft - $225
Median Sales Price - $234,000
Average Days on Market - 213

*Data taken from KAARMLS on 12/08/08 does not include adjacent neighborhoods or single family residences.

As always, if you want any more information about any of these properties just give me a shout.

If you would like to receive a full list of properties for sale in this neighborhood, or if you would like to be notified of new listings, send me an email with either “Current Downtown Condo Listings” or “New Downtown Condo Listings” in the subject line and I’ll take care of the rest. Save the spammy for your mammy.

Know of a great community that would make an equally great NOTW? Let your voice be heard in the comments.

Special thanks to AAKT’s in-house photographer, Robert Stockdale. Without him, NOTW would be just a bunch of boring text. Find out more about Robert’s work here.

photo credit: pattie74_99

The Weekly Poll is up and ready and rarin’ to go. Go ahead and give it a good left clickin’.

This week’s topic is downtown condos. There are lots of new condos for sale in downtown KTown and lots more being built, but with an average cost of almost $250 per square foot and an average size of just under 1400 sq ft, they may not be affordable or practical for every buyer. So what about you? Would you live in downtown or is it too expensive? Or maybe it’s just not practical? Would it be your dream or your worst nightmare? Cast your vote and let me know.

And while a downtown loft might be a little out of your reach, you can always have the latest news on the Knoxville real estate market right at your fingertips - subscribe to All Around KTown in a feed reader or by email today!

It’s the middle of the month again and that means it’s Home Sales Report time. For those of you new to this shindig, every month I look at the Knoxville Area Association of Realtors Sales Report statistics and tell you what sold and for how much as compared to the same month the previous year.

So here’s the July Home Sales Report breakdown the only way I know how to do it — All Around K-Town style.

Let’s look at the good news first:

Average sales price for 2 or less BR homes is (way) up.
July ‘07 - $111,500
July ‘08 - $146,100

Average sales price for 4+ BR homes is up.
July ‘07 - $298,100
July ‘08 - $307,700

Median sales price for 4+ BR homes is (slightly) up.
July ‘07 - $261,700
July ‘08 - $262,500