BusinessReport.com

While Baton Rouge has not been hit as hard by the real estate slump as have other cities around the country, the slowdown in the housing sector is making its presence known here, especially when it comes to the sale of high-end homes. The Country Club of Louisiana is no exception.

“It is slowing down,” says Gertrude Cramer, a Realtor who lives in CCLA and has sold there since it opened in 1987. “I especially see it in the more expensive homes.”

Statistics reflect that trend. The average home sale price in CCLA this year is $666,000. That’s 20% lower than the average sale price of $833,000 in 2007 and 18% lower than the average of $829,000 in 2006.

Granted, only four homes have sold since January, and two of those were in the low end of the CCLA price range, the mid-$500,000s. In other words, the average sale price this year is not necessarily representative of what the subdivision overall might do in the coming months. But that so few homes have sold suggests a sluggish pace of activity.

What’s more, houses are spending a long time on the market—in some cases more than a year. On average, it’s more like five months. That is a conservative figure that can be somewhat misleading, however, because if a listed house is taken off the market for a time—to be updated, for instance, or because the seller switches agents—the clock is restarted when it goes back on the market. In reality, a home might be on the market far longer than the statistical average of 163 days.

“I have a house I’m working on right now that another agent had before me,” explains Jerry del Rio, a Realtor who lives and works in CCLA. “I just put it back on the market, so really it’s officially been on the market 13 months, but it’s not going to show that in the MLS data.”

Agents attribute the slowdown to several factors. They say part of it’s seasonal. January and February are typically slow months. Since then, the pace of activity has picked up and three homes are currently under contract, but statistics don’t reflect those sales.

They also point out that potential buyers are having trouble selling their homes in other markets around the country. Cramer is representing such a client at the moment, a couple from Florida that is relocating to Baton Rouge.

“They want to buy in CCL but they can’t sell their home in Miami, where the real estate market has been much harder hit,” Cramer says. “It’s slowing things down.”

Another factor affecting CCLA sales is the age of some of its homes. When Jack Nicklaus developed the premier golf course community in 1986, it was unique in these parts. Though it’s still one of the few guarded gated communities in Baton Rouge, it’s by no means the only luxury community: University Club and newer areas of Santa Maria are giving CCLA a run for its money.

“At one time, CCL and Bocage were the only place you could go to buy an upscale home,” del Rio says. “But look at what’s happened in the past three years: You have developers sticking their necks out on $1.4 million spec houses, and that means competition for CCL.”

Those newer spec houses have an updated look that some of the older homes in CCLA don’t, hard as that might be to believe. Homes built in the late 1980s had more of an Acadian look than today’s popular Mediterranean style, and the kitchens were done up in jewel tones with tile countertops.

“My house actually had formica in the kitchen when I bought it,” Cramer says. “A lot of these houses are not old enough to be charming, but they were built with materials that are out of date.”

All that said, buyers looking for a real bargain won’t find it in CCLA. The newest and biggest homes in the subdivision are commanding as much as $500 per square foot. Even the older homes that need updating fetch upwards of $170 per square foot. And while home sales have hardly been brisk this year, only 26 out of 600 homes are currently on the market, including three under contract, which agents interpret as a good sign.

Photo by Brian Baiamonte

“We have very little inventory right now,” del Rio says.

What’s more, the three sales pending are for more expensive homes than those that sold earlier this year. Assuming they go through, they will drive up the average home sale price, which observers expect to continue to increase over previous years—just not as dramatically as it has increased in the past.

“CCL will always do well,” del Rio says. “No one’s lost money on it.”