There will be a Lunch and Learn this Wednesday focusing on QR Codes.

If you don’t want to read this whole article you can go away with this: most of the speakers thought 2012 would be like 2011 only better.

Neil Fried was the first speaker and he did focus mostly on Alaska. Currently Alaska is #2 in job growth behind North Dakota. Although Alaska is better off than most of the lower 48 there are some clouds on the horizon. Mostly Freid is worried about a reduction in dollars from the federal government and a possible oil production decrease. Commodity prices are high and look like they will stay high for awhile. That is good for all sectors of Alaska natural resource extraction, from copper to gold to coal, so there will continue to be a demand for natural resource production.

Brian Meissner

Brandon Walker

Ted Jensen was the last speaker focusing on office space mostly in Anchorage. While the vacancy rate is a healthy 6% compared to 16% nationwide, it appears that the supply will slightly increase next year with diminishing demand. This doesn’t bode well for investors wanting to get into this market. As with the others however, he does not expect any large movements in the economy, things appear to be pretty stable.

Ice is always a problem in the winter. But window icing can be controlled. In fact it should be controlled.

The first thing you watch for is air movement by the windows. If you are blocking air movement at the windows with blinds or curtains, or if you are covering a heat register below the window, you need to fix this problem first. You may only need to raise the bottom of the blinds and inch or so to fix the problem. Usually you will need to do more than this.

If you still have ice on the windows your house is telling you that the humidity is too high relative to the temperature of the glass on your windows. The water vapor in the air has reached the dew point when it starts to condense on your windows. When the water vapor in the air gets cool enough, it will condense into fog and then as it cools further it turns to ice. This temperature is relative in that it will be different with different levels of humidity and air pressure.

You should watch your windows closely in the winter for signs of moisture. When you see water droplets or a light fog starting to accumulate on the bottoms of your windows your house is saying that you need to decrease the humidity. As far as I know that is the only factor over which you have control. I have tried, but so far have not found a way to raise the outside temperature or change the barometric pressure.

If you do not lower the humidity you will not only have condensation on the windows where you can see it, but you may be getting condensation in places you cannot see it, and that can cause mold. That is why you should not ignore window condensation. Think of condensation on your windows as an early warning sign, just like your smoke detector warns of fire, condensation can warn of mold.

There are two ways to decrease the humidity in your house. One is to exchange some of the humid interior air for the dry outside air. The other is to invest in a dehumidifier. I don’t have much experience with dehumidifiers and the little experience I do have has been disappointing so I will not go into this method at all.

Alaskan winter air is dry. Generally, the colder it gets in Alaska, the dryer is the air. You need to get some of that dry air into your house and let out some of the humid air. Many homes have an air exchange system that is controllable. You need to increase the air exchanges until the condensation goes away. This means that you should have a way to measure the humidity. You can buy a humidity meter at most department stores. You may have to bring the humidity below 20% which is uncomfortable for many people. Still, it’s better to deal with a little discomfort now than a lot of discomfort later.

If you don’t have an air exchange system, you can still take care of this problem by just barely opening a window on one side of the house and then turning on a kitchen fan or bathroom fan in the other side of the house. That will bring in the dry air and release the humid air. You will need to keep doing this until the humidity drops enough to stop the condensation on the windows. It’s a balancing act that you need to watch carefully.

The numbers in the chart are for the whole Mat-Su Valley which includes everything from Trapper Creek to Eureka. But the vast majority of the real estate action is in the core area of Palmer and Wasilla.

Probably the most interesting thing to notice is how steady the market has been for the last 4 years. The amount of total sales and the median price is pretty even over that time. There was a significant drop in sales in 2007 and 2008 but I would say there has been no meaningful change since then.

I had people raise the possibility that perhaps you can get more for their money now. In other words, maybe the price hasn’t dropped, but you get a bigger bank for the buck. That is why I included that median price per square foot. This gives you an indication of how much house you can get for the money. You can see that there was a big jump in price per square foot from 2005 to 2006 and then a drop between 2007 and 2008 but it’s been pretty steady ever since.

But take a look at the chart below and draw your own conclusions.

Year	Total Sales	Median Price	Median Price Per Sq Ft
2005	1,676	$192,440	$114
2006	1,638	$206,000	$126
2007	1,496	$209,000	$127
2008	1,202	$205,728	$121
2009	1,156	$203,000	$123
2010	1,168	$206,000	$120
2011	1,230	$205,950	$120

More important info from Valley Market Real Estate:

Foreclosures are 14% of our market.

Here are a few of the cases he reviewed.

1. Varilek v. Burke. The Alaska Supreme court decided that a landowner who appeals a tax evaluation bears the entire burden of proof to show that the evaluation was improper.   Serving on the Mat-Su Borough Board of Equalization showed me that this is entirely true and I would have been surprised by any other finding.   If you want to contest your tax evaluation you better bring some hard evidence with you to show that the borough is wrong.

2. Trask v Ketchikan.  A Ketchikan resident painted a biblical message on her roof, and after her uphill neighbors complained, the borough told her to remove it because it was an illegal sign.  She fought it all the way to the Alaska Supreme Court and won.  The Supreme Court ruled that her constitutional rights were violated so that she had a Federal Case against the borough and she could also get her attorney fees back. I wonder if we will begin to notice roof messages all over the state.

3.  Shaffer v. Bellows. In this case two men were going to buy an island together outside of Sitka.  Before they closed the deal they had a dispute between them.  They agreed that one would buy the island and the other would receive an option to buy when and if the first person decided to sell.  They agreed on a fixed price plus inflation.  After many years the owner of the island decided not to sell but to gift it to his sister.  The second man took him to court because he wanted to exercise his option to buy.  The Supreme Court remanded the case back to the lower court for further evidence because it appeared to be fraud.   The big lesson here is to be very careful giving anyone a first right of refusal or an option to purchase unless it is very specific and has a definite ending date.

In addition to other cases Mike brought us up to date on Real Estate Activity from a title company’s point of view.

Here are the total recordings in the Palmer Recording Office, (the Palmer office records most of the activity in the Mat-Su Borough).  These are from January through November of every year.

• 2007…30,493
• 2008…25,881
• 2009…26,319
• 2010…24,213
• 2011…23,687