A look ahead: Home building expected to pick up in 2018
Housing construction in Hoover is expected to pick up a notch in 2018 after a slower 2017, according to the city’s primary developer and home builder.
Signature Homes, which typically accounts for 70 to 80 percent of the home building in Hoover, expects to build 200 to 230 houses in 2018, President Jonathan Belcher said. That compares to about 150 in 2017 and 283 in 2016, he said.
Citywide, there were 185 new homes sold in Hoover in the first 11 months of 2017, with an average price of $435,000, according to Multiple Listing Service data provided by Signature Homes (Full December data was not yet available). That compares with 357 new homes sold in Hoover in 2016, with an average price of $431,000.
Belcher attributed his company’s slowdown in Hoover sales in 2017 to its focus on getting land ready for two new subdivisions — Lake Wilborn and Blackridge — at what had been the end of Stadium Trace Parkway.
Home construction has begun in Lake Wilborn, and people should start moving into those houses in early spring, Belcher said. A $2.5 million lodge with a pool and lake access in the first sector of Lake Wilborn should be completed by May 1, he said. He expects to build 80 to 100 homes in Lake Wilborn in 2018, with homes priced in the mid $300,000s to the $600,000s.
Next door, in Blackridge, Belcher expects to have about 20 homes occupied by the end of 2018, both on the lake and off the water. The lakefront sites already are available for purchase, and 40 of the first 52 already have been bought, he said. Homes in Blackridge will start in the $500,000s but some will be priced at more than $1 million, he said.
Nearby, next to Bumpus Middle School, Signature Homes hopes to start building homes in the new Flemming Farms community in the fourth quarter of 2018 but does not expect to have any people moving in there until 2019, Belcher said.
Signature Homes also intends to start building the first of 177 homes planned to the southeast of the Chestnut Trace community toward the end of 2018, but no residents are expected there until 2019, he said.
To the north, in Ross Bridge, Signature Homes plans to build the final 13 houses of 40 in the Taylor’s Court community in the Ross Bridge Village Center in 2018, Belcher said. All the lots already have been sold,he said.
Also in Ross Bridge, the houses in the Reynolds Landing “smart home” community have been selling at a quick rate, Belcher said. They went on the market in June, and all but four of the 62 houses were sold as of mid-December, he said. The average price of those houses is in the upper $300,000s, he said. Sixteen of the Reynolds Landing houses were expected to be occupied by the end of 2017, and all the rest should be occupied by the middle of 2018, Belcher said.
Signature Homes also has one more sector of the Glasscott subdivision in Ross Bridge to build. Twenty-two home sites should go on the market in March, and construction should begin in the summer, Belcher said. However, he’s not sure if any of them will be complete by the end of 2018, he said. Those custom-built homes will be priced in the $700,000s, he said.
In eastern Hoover, Signature Homes has completed 17 houses in the Brock Point community off Shelby County 41 next to Greystone and across from Shoal Creek and plans to build 35 to 40 more homes there in 2018 and the same number in 2019, Belcher said. There will be 97 houses in Brock Point when it is complete, he said. Most of the houses there are priced in the $500,000s to $700,000s, he said.
Embassy Homes continues to build new homes in the McGill Crossings community between Deer Valley and Ross Bridge, and several builders are involved in home construction in the The Preserve and Lake Cyrus communities.
Belcher said low interest rates have continued to bolster a favorable market for both buyers and sellers. There is a lot of optimism in the economy and certainly in the real estate market in Hoover, he said. He expects home prices in Hoover to continue to show modest appreciation, he said.