Washington, D.C

Is Buying a Condo Worth it in WASHINGTON DC | 5 Reasons

Published

2 years ago

March 11, 2024

Is Buying a Condo Worth it in WASHINGTON DC

Condos enjoyed a decades-long run of popularity in the Nation’s Capital. Then this thing called Covid hit and everyone scrambled to get out to the suburbs. They wanted land and space. This was short-sighted, even without knowing how long the pandemic would last. Now that we are coming up on the four-year anniversary of the world lockdown, how has condominium ownership fared? And is it time to consider buying a condo again?

Buyers have come back to the condo market, and the condo market is embracing them. The condo was in the corner of the room, smoking a cigarette, nursing a gin and tonic and saying, “Of all the gin joints in all the town, in all the world…”

I’m going to tell you five reasons why it’s a great idea to consider buying a condo.

1) Not many other people are…yet

Who do we always quote around here? Warren Buffet – Be greedy when others are fearful and fearful when others are greedy. Since 2023 when mortgage rates started rising, we’ve seen a resurfacing in the interest in condos. Why? These are buyers who have been priced out of single-family homes. The rat race of chasing the new homes, watching the prices get bid up, the contingencies be waived, that got old after a couple years. Condos in DC basically fell off a cliff and became very difficult to sell. We’ve seen a resurgence of people coming back to reconsider a condo. Of course, city life having opened back up again has helped.

Historically, as in, pre-covid, condos weren’t as sought after in the suburbs as they were in DC. People wanted their city-living but when they moved out to Northern Virginia or Montgomery County Maryland it was to buy a house. That’s not the case anymore in many parts of Northern Virginia. I have a client who is currently finding multiple offers on condos in places like Oakton, Reston and Herndon.

2) The Condo Market is Ready to Embrace Buyers

There is enough for sale in many areas that the buyer now has options of places to see, and choices to make. This is a good feeling when the last decade has been a time where all choices have been taken from buyers. You won’t have to settle. You can get a place that checks most if not all your boxes.

3) Escalations are Minimal

In cases where there is interest from multiple buyers, translating to multiple offers, you won’t see escalations like you used to or that you see on houses. The price escalations may go up $10,000 – $15,000. And while I get that this is money you would rather not spend, this feels like a dream compared to what things used to be like with a mass exodus of the condo market to single family homes and escalations of hundreds of thousands of dollars over asking price.

It’s also easier to “predict” what will happen on a condo escalation as opposed to houses where it was anyone’s guess if it would go up $50,000, $100,000 or $300,000.

4) Minimal Upkeep

Do you want to spend time mowing lawns, shoveling sidewalks or constantly fighting mice. Because that’s what homeownership has boiled down to for us. We don’t want to spend our time doing these things and it can be a real drag. I miss the days of dumping my trash down a chute and never seeing it again. I won’t miss not being on the email list serv for the rat patrol for our alley, where we’re reminded to put a rock on our trash cans to keep the rodents away.

If you are back to a life of travel and leisure again, then the idea of turning the key and walking away from a condo and not needing anyone to watch it for you is pretty appealing.

5) The Lender is Your Friend

You may recall that during the whole Covid pandemic, we also witnessed the collapse of the Surfside Condo building in Miami. Things changed with lenders as a result of this, and they changed for the better. Side note – I have a couple videos on condo documents and what you should look for in reviewing them.

Long before Surfside, I would tell anyone who would listen that I despise 1980’s construction. It feels shoddy no matter where it is. My condo in DC is from the early 80’s and it’s been riddled with issues that trace back to the corners that were cut when it was built. My parents had an early 80’s condo in Florida, same thing. You can usually tell 80’s construction by its general ugliness and popcorn ceilings. Surfside was also a 1981 product.

Your lender is going to do everything in their power to ensure you don’t find yourself in a Surfside situation. They have strengthened the requirements of condos, requiring larger amounts to be set aside for reserves, engineering studies in some areas and stronger insurance requirements. In some places like Florida all eyes are on insurance and the companies and the state have gotten involved to mandate more protections for these homes. In many cases, condos are forced to replace roofs at regular increments (i.e. every 20 years) regardless of condition, otherwise their insurance company could drop them.

We’re only seeing the beginning of this in the DC Area, but I did tour a condo in Northern Virginia that had structural issues. They still had multiple offers, but whether it makes it through financing is another story. My client and I determined this was a risk not worth taking.

Are condos going away? I vote no. They aren’t making any more land and as the population explodes, we need places for people to live. The prices on condos now are fantastic and I wholeheartedly believe their heyday is coming.

Source link

Washington, D.C

Storm Team4 Forecast: A chilly, gusty Sunday before a cool start to the week

Published

4 hours ago

April 19, 2026

Press Room

Storm Team4 Forecast: A chilly, gusty Sunday before a cool start to the week

4 things to know about the weather:

Chances of rain in the morning
Gusty Sunday
Chilly Monday
Temps will rise again through the work week

Download the NBC Washington app on iOS and Android to check the weather radar on the go.

After a nice and warm Saturday, changes arrive for part two of the weekend.

The first half of your Sunday will have a chance for showers. Winds will pick up with our next system and are expected to gust to about 20-30 mph. Cooler air will settle in, and lows Sunday night fall into the 40s.

Highs temps Monday will reach only into the mid to upper 50s.

However, temperatures will rise through the week, so you won’t need your jackets every day.

QuickCast

SUNDAY:
Showers, then partly cloudy
Wind: NW 10-15 mph
Gusts @ 30 mph
HIGH: Lower 60s

MONDAY:
Partly cloudy
Wind: NW 10-15 mph
Gusts @ 25 mph
HIGH: Upper 50s

Stay with Storm Team4 for the latest forecast. Download the NBC Washington app on iOS and Android to get severe weather alerts on your phone.

Source link

Washington, D.C

‘It’s a twilight zone’: Iran war casts deep shadows over IMF gathering in Washington

Published

1 day ago

April 18, 2026

Press Room

‘It’s a twilight zone’: Iran war casts deep shadows over IMF gathering in Washington

The most severe energy shock since the 1970s, the risk of a global recession and households everywhere stomaching a renewed surge in the cost of living – hitting the most vulnerable hardest.

In a sweltering hot Washington DC this week, the message at the International Monetary Fund meetings was chilling: things had been looking up for living standards around the world. But then came the Iran war.

“Some countries are in panic,” said the fund’s managing director, Kristalina Georgieva, addressing the finance ministers and central bank bosses in town for the IMF and World Bank spring meetings. “The sooner it [the Iran war] ends, the better for everybody.”

Such gatherings are not typically used to fight geopolitical battles. “You don’t get people shouting at one another at these things,” one senior figure remarked. But, as a record-breaking April heatwave swept the US capital, no one could ignore the mounting damage from the Iran war.

Those familiar with the mood over breakfast at a meeting of the G20’s representatives on Thursday, which included Donald Trump’s treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, and the outgoing US Federal Reserve chair, Jerome Powell – said the atmosphere in the room was sombre amid an open exchange of serious views.

“It is such a twilight-zone meeting,” said Mohamed El-Erian, a former IMF deputy managing director who is now chief economic adviser at the Allianz insurance group. “There are several shadows hanging over it: one is the shadow that comes from concern about the global economy as a whole.

“The second is that some countries are going to be particularly hard hit, and it’s mostly countries that very few people are talking about. But the third concern is the adding of insult to injury: the fact that the US, which started a war of choice, is going to be hit, but by a lot less than elsewhere in relative terms.”

Before Thursday’s breakfast, Rachel Reeves had started her day with an early-morning jog. Joined by her counterparts from Spain, Australia and New Zealand for a run down the iconic National Mall, she posted an Instagram selfie with a not-so-subtle dig: “Friends that run together – work together.”

A day earlier, the chancellor had told a CNBC conference that she thought “friends are allowed to disagree on things” as she criticised Trump’s Iran war as a “mistake” and a “folly” that had not made the world safer.

Rachel Reeves posted this image on Instagram from Washington DC on Thursday with the message: ‘Friends that run together – work together.’ Photograph: Rachel Reeves/Instagram

Speaking at a venue just steps away from the White House, before a one-on-one meeting with Bessent, she said this “fair message” was needed because UK families and businesses were feeling the pain from higher energy prices triggered by the conflict.

Those close to Reeves insist her meeting remained cordial. Britain and the US have significant shared interests in AI, financial services and trade. The chancellor also said the UK government had little time for the Iranian regime.

But with the IMF having warned on Tuesday that the Iran war could risk a global recession – in which Britain would be the biggest G7 casualty – it was clear Reeves had travelled to Washington ready to pick a fight.

“I’m struck by how vocal she has been and the words she used,” said one global financier. “We know the disagreement between Bessent and [European Central Bank president] Christine Lagarde earlier in the year. But that was in private.”

At a cocktail party held at the British ambassador’s residence for hundreds of diplomats and financiers – including the Bank of England’s governor, Andrew Bailey, the chief executive of Barclays, CS Venkatakrishnan, and dozens of senior figures – this transatlantic tension, weeks before King Charles’s US state visit, was a major topic of conversation.

The other, in the balmy residence gardens, was one of its former occupants, Peter Mandelson, as revelations about the former ambassador’s appointment threatened to further rock the UK government.

Before the war, the agenda for the IMF had been about global cooperation; the adoption of AI, jobs and work to eradicate poverty. Each of those tasks had now been complicated, but not least the task of countries working together.

For many at the meetings, the focus was on forging closer global cooperation without the world’s pre-eminent superpower.

“Everybody is talking about how you hedge against American decisions,” said David Miliband, the former UK foreign secretary, who now runs the International Rescue Committee. “You can’t do without them, because they’re 25% of the global economy. But, in a lot of fora, they’ve pulled out.

“So everyone has to think, how does one structure international cooperation? The old west is not coming back. And so everyone has to figure out how to position themselves for that world.”

For those gathering in Washington, there was irony in the fact that they were meeting in the halls of institutions founded, under US leadership, to promote global cooperation after the second world war. The whole idea of the Bretton Woods institutions was to avoid the dire economic conditions and warfare of the 1930s and 1940s. Yet this year’s meeting was taking place amid these intertwining problems.

In their conversations about the best economic policy response to the shock of conflict, the economists also knew the real power to make a difference lay two blocks across town from the IMF and the World Bank – behind the security cordons and construction equipment blocking the White House from public view. “It is not clear they can do anything about it,” said El-Erian.

Still, with a booming economy driven by AI – including Anthropic’s powerful Mythos model, the topic of much conversation – most countries cannot afford to completely break off US ties.

“People want to find ways to insulate themselves from the mess. But, on the other hand, they admire the US private sector,” El-Erian said. “The best way I’ve heard it put, is: they want to go long the private sector and short the mess. But it’s almost impossible to do.”

Source link