Sisters remains a desirable community for new buyers but inventory is in short supply at the entry level price range. Real estate listings throughout Central Oregon are selling fast if they are priced under $300,000 but those listings are in short supply in most areas. Real estate is a business of changing cycles and with the recent sellers market there is now a big shortage of affordable homes and properties in the Sisters area.
Like many of its neighboring cities Sisters real estate over the past few years began to improve and with the increased sales these towns sold most of their lower priced inventory. By mid 2013 and to the present inventory in the affordable price ranges are sold as fast as they hit the market. The current market in Sisters provides two demographic groups for home buying; first time home buyers and downsizing seniors or second home buyers.
Peter Storton, principal broker of Sisters RE/MAX, says, “The residential market is good, but the real concern is inventory in the right price range, and that price range is anywhere from $250-$260,000…if you looked in MLS you would only find a few listings in that affordable price range…It is a very significant price range for people who are coming in as new home buyers or for those seniors that are scaling down and it limits the more affordable options and properties.
“For the market $500,000 and above there is plenty of inventory but the market is sluggish and we don’t have a real reason for it…there are other affordable priced homes soon going in including Hayden Homes which is adding significant inventory in Sisters. Recently the former Sisters Business Park was re-zoned from light industrial to residential for up to 80 homes on twenty acres in the under $300,000 price range…so there will be development of this price range in our near future.”
Along with a more stable real estate market Sisters has manifested several other positive changes that will ultimately affect the livability and real estate of the area. Over the winter months Sisters has completed major improvements and remodeled the downtown area with streets, sidewalks, lighting, benches and landscaping. This should promote economic development and enhance livability in downtown Sisters.
There will soon be another addition to the town as the Sisters planning commission recently approved the Adams Avenue Commons project, a 10-lot master plan development on a 1.5 acre parcel. This is an exciting project for a small town to attract home buyers, families and business minded folks in a pedestrian environment and will include 25 studio apartments, six commercial-lease spaces downstairs with apartments upstairs, two adult-foster-care homes and inclusion of a learning center daycare facility called the Little Frog.
Sisters retail and commercial business activity is also steadily improving with recent activity in those sectors says Storton, “Sisters is busy near Outlaw Station with new a eye care center and Subway… we have a St. Charles medical clinic in town, a new Car Wash and Card Lock Gas Station being built.”
“Unless world events cause us to be affected or the economy is impacted, Sisters is just one of the most desirable communities in Central Oregon…the school district receives a lot of accolades, the community and its appearance and the activities that take place here from rodeos to folk festivals just makes a major attraction to move to this community.”
