PARAMOUNT MORTGAGE - LENDER'S BLOG

By Anne T. Makeever - St. Louis Post-Dispatch

2007 Most Affordable Places to Live Well 1. Minneapolis 2. Indianapolis 3. Cincinnati 4. St. Louis 5. Houston 6. Milwaukee 7. Dallas 8. Pittsburgh 9. Columbus 10. Atlanta Information from Forbes magazine, www.forbes.com

We St. Louisans know our city well and know we have it pretty good, especially yen we read about gas prices exceeding the $3 mark on one coast or the other while it costs consistently less to fill our own tanks. We hear about the real estate market’s downward spiral, which causes us to look around and comment, "Really? Where?" That’s because we are watching with anticipation our city’s downtown district rumble to life in a clouds of construction dust. And because we know in St. Louis it’s still possible to sell a house in a matter of days. We have neighbors who have done just that.

Nevertheless, its’ nice when a voice of authority, someone with statistics rather than instinct, conforms what we feel to be true. That happened this week with Forbes magazine released its "Most Affordable Places to Live Well" list an d placed St. Louis in the top five - actually, we’re No. 4, to be precise (just after Minneapolis, Indianapolis and Cincinnati and just before Houston).

In explaining St. Louis’ ranking, Forbes writer Matt Woolsey said of our city. "What makes St. Louis a desirable housing market [is] its relative stability." In other words, the St. Louis real estate market holds steady even when other markets are wobbling.

Woolsey addressed St. Louis’ tendency to remain insulated from such volatility when he wrote, "The area isn’t as bogged down in risky loans and defaults as other Midwestern cities."

St. Louis finds itself on such lists all the time. We are a "smartest place to live" (Kiplinger’s Personal Finance magazine). a "best place to live" (Money magazine), on of the "best cities for singles" (Forbes again) and the "second most affordable" large metropolitan are in the country (National Association of Home Builders).

These superlatives come our way because our real estate market is, indeed strong and sturdy. We consistently do well in these top-ten or top-100 lists thanks to that very stability. In short, St. Louis is a good place to live because St. Louisans can afford to buy homes. According to Forbes, the median home price here is a reasonable $134,400. In St. Louis, 77 percent of the houses for sale are within the reach of the median income-earning household (per the National Association of Home Builders and Wells Fargo’s affordability index).

Thanks to the Forbes list, and all the others, reality is pretty easy to see. Houses are selling, the local mortgage industry is sold an St. Louis is a very good place to "live well."