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Monday, January 26, 2009
Upgrade It…Does Sandy Springs need a re-do?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
A couple of years ago the folks in our neighborhood noted with raised eyebrow that some of the homes that were being built in sites previously occupied by ‘50s-era brick ranch were going for $950,000.
Homes within two miles were going into seven figures.
A lot of people predicated Sandy Springs was going to become a place where only the wealthy could afford to live, as though 30328 was going to become the next 90210. To hear some tell it Donald Trump and Oprah would be Sandy Springsteens any day now.
And this inevitably led to the usual outcry over what prosperity would bring; it would force out “the little guy.” I have no idea exactly who this little guy is, but he always seems to be trotted out to bear the brunt of societal change. Are tall people and women immune to these things?
Two years and an economic meltdown later many of those pricey homes are still sitting there, waiting for their first homeowner, which leads me to believe the little guy still walks in our midst.
But it does beg the question of whether there is something wrong with our neighborhoods going through an upgrade?
I get it — when homes go up in size and price it blocks a certain segment of the population out of a community, but I don’t recall making sure everyone can afford to live in a zip code being a requirement. I know a few builders and all are in business to make money. I have yet to meet a single one whose business plan is to put up enough luxury homes in a specific area to price out a certain group.
And Sandy Springs has already survived that scenario once. When the population started to grow in the early ‘60s the city was jam-packed with young families. As the kids grew up and left for college and beyond the value of the homes their empty-nest parents remained in increased sharply. The result was neighborhoods full of high-priced homes that were out of the grasp of young families, or young adults looking for their first home.
And guess what? Sandy Springs did not find itself in a state of societal perdition. The walls did not come a’crumblin’ down.
Which begs the question — what is it about prosperity that offends and scares certain segments of the population? Why would it be a bad thing if five years from now the average price for a home in Sandy Springs was $1.5 million?
I know, I know — it would price out the little guy. But one would hope in five years time the little guy would have gone back to school, gotten a degree and built a business that would allow him to live wherever he wanted.
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