Wednesday, August 27, 2008
EMAIL PAGE 
PRINT PAGE
Stay informed and on track with this FREE quarterly newsletter customized to your child's year in school:
REAL ESTATE NEAR A COLLEGE CAN BE A GOOD INVESTMENT
Despite the high price of college, you can take some comfort in the fact that your investment in a college education will pay dividends in the long run, with higher career earnings potential of a $1,000,000 or more for your child being one of many good reasons why to spend money on college tuition.
Now, if a recent study by real estate giant Coldwell Banker proves true, tuition itself may not be the only investment that a parent can make with a confident expectation of a strong return. Real estate near a college campus – almost any college campus – is proving to be a valuable commodity.
While some areas near college campuses are deemed “expensive” and others “affordable” in real-estate parlance, the bottom line is that these “college” communities offer unique opportunities for homeowners.
Let’s start with the affordable side of the coin, highlighting a place that many of you who are members of College Parents of America will find familiar: good old Lubbock, Texas, home of our friends – and your sons and daughters – who work at and attend Texas Tech University.
According to Coldwell Banker’s recently released College Market Home Price Comparison index, Lubbock is the “most affordable” college town in the country, weighing in with an average cost of $164,133 for a typical 2,200-square-foot single-family home nearby the Texas Tech campus.
Do the mental math on anticipated mortgage and maintenance costs, and I think you can quickly see why investing in real estate as a place for your young adult student (and perhaps friends) to live may make a lot of sense.
Ranking just below Lubbock (and Texas Tech) on Coldwell Banker’s “affordability” scale are:
- Starkville, Mississippi, home of Mississippi State University;
- Baton Rouge, Louisiana, home of Louisiana State University;
- South Bend, Indiana, home of Notre Dame University; and
- Knoxville, Tennessee, home of the University of Tennessee.
In each of these ranked communities, the “typical” homes described above can be purchased for $175,000 or less today and, due to their locations near institutions of higher learning, are likely to appreciate at a greater rate than the market in general.
According to Coldwell Banker, college towns are seen as family-friendly, lively communities, with an abundance of cultural and recreational activities, thereby making them extremely desirable as places to live or to invest.
Some “college towns” were discovered long ago, or are part of metropolitan areas where housing costs are already high, some might say stratospheric. The polar opposite of Lubbock, Texas in terms of cost is Palo Alto, California, home to Stanford University and considered by Coldwell Banker to the most “expensive” community near a college. The “typical” 2,200-square-foot home in Palo Alto currently clocks in at $1,550,000 and, at that price, may have gone up during the time it took me to spell-check this column and hit the send button.
Rounding out the top five priciest college towns are:
- Westwood (Los Angeles), California, home of UCLA;
- Berkeley, California, home of U-Cal Berkeley;
- Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, home of Boston College; and
- Evanston, Illinois, home of my alma mater Northwestern University.
Of course, real estate in those towns, and in college communities such as Coral Gables, Florida or Boulder, Colorado, is likely to also go up at a higher rate than the national average, but it takes a lot more financial wherewithal to get in the game in those places than it does in Lubbock.
It is a geographical fact that all of the most “affordable” (in current dollars) college communities are located in either the South or the Midwest. These college towns that are lighter on the wallet also tend to be relatively small in size and far in distance from major airports.
Join Now to Take Advantage of These Valuable Deals and Discounts!
