It can be difficult to figure out what the market is doing in Rappahannock. With 2-3 sales a month, most months, it's difficult to discern trends. And, given the enormous price ranges found in properties in the county, any snapshot is sure to lead to incorrect conclusions.

But I've had a couple of conversations this week with property owners in Rappahannock County that had me wondering about pricing overall. In several instances property owners said they knew their properties were overpriced but they had no intention of lowering the price. They said they weren't "desperate" and could wait out any temporary market downturn.

And, of course, they're no doubt correct. While most homes are both a home and an asset for most families. There are a lot of property owners in Rappahannock for whom the property is more heavily weighted towards asset. It's easier to wait this out if you don't have to sell your property here in order to move on somewhere else.

And, the dollar value of sales stayed relatively consistent this year. A total of almost $16 million sold in 2007. In 2008 that total was almost $14.5 million. What was down significantly were the number of transactions. There were 42 in 2007. It looks like we'll finish with about 30 total sales in 2008.

Meanwhile, inventory has risen pretty dramatically. There were 67 properties on the market at the end of 2007. Today there are about 98, an increase of about 30%. We hit a high at the end of October with 103 properties for sale.

Rappahannock took longer to feel the effects of this downturn. And, in a normal economy with a normal real estate slump, there may not have been much of an impact at all here. But the economic fiasco we find ourselves in nationally has not spared the residents of Rappahannock. There have been foreclosures here as well, with more likely to come. And there's an increasingly long list of people who really do want to sell their properties but can't (at least at their current price).

So, how long does the stalemate last? How long are sellers willing or able to wait for the market to recover. In the region overall I believe it could be 5-10 years before we see property values anywhere near what we saw, say, in 2005. Even if you're not "desperate" how long do you want to hold on?

2009 promises to be an interesting year in Rappahannock real estate! What do you think lies ahead?