A Different Drummer

Will your home be standing in 20 years? Most residential property owners in the City of Falls Church saw the value of their land rise far faster than the value of the structure on it in the annual assessments that were sent out recently. In many cases, the land value tripled even as the structure value even declined. What does this signify?

The obvious answer is that, since assessments are supposed to reflect 100% of the market value of a property, the land on which your home sits is coveted by prospective buyers much more than your house and garage. If you sell, unless it is already a mansion, your home is likely to be seriously expanded or demolished and replaced with something new and big that can be re-sold for even more than you got.

The same goes for the transformation of your land into some commercial or mixed use.

It is interesting that professional developers look at land entirely differently than either the average citizen or even City officials and planners. It's a difference in the applications of far-sightedness and appreciation for potential. Most folks just assume that the way things are the way they will be, except for minor changes here and there. The fact that things seem to happen gradually feeds this notion. As for City officials and planners, they can seldom envision a future that they don't control. Even though instruments such as "Comprehensive Plans" are merely napkin sketches based on current thinking that can be revised at any time, they are treated like concrete blueprints for the future. There is no zoning ordinance that cannot be revised by the actions of some governing body in the future.

Good developers don't think in terms of any of this. They think in terms of the market potential of a region. In their minds, they can easily wipe any current housing or commercial uses off the landscape and any current zoning or density limits out of city or county codes.

The most relevant case in point for Falls Church is the imminent development explosion around the East Falls Church Metro station, driven not by current realities or county plans (the Arlington County Board hasn't gotten around to reevaluating that area for years), but by market potential, alone. Thus, developers are quietly going door to door in the neighborhood looking to buy up everything that moves, or doesn't. They want to keep their efforts low profile, because they obviously want to minimize the competition. That's why none of us are supposed to know anything about this.

It may come as a blow to the ego of some City of Falls Church officials, but properties in the City, including at its City Center intersection of Routes 29 and 7, given comparative locations and cost of the real estate, are a second priority to what's for sale closer to the East Falls Church Metro station and I-66.