Owner: Elegant Augusta GA Real Estate Blog URL:www.northofthesavannah.com/posts/ Join Date: Sun, 15 Apr 2007 11:59:57 -0500 Rating:0 Site Description: The Elegant Augusta GA Real Estate Blog offers local information, fun posts, and whatever else strikes our fancy as interesting. If you want drab market analysis full of statistics, go elsewhere, that's not our bag, baby! Site statistics:Click here
Friday the 13th News Desk Cleanup 2007-04-13 22:04:16 I was trying to come up with an interesting news post for today but it’s a little hard to concentrate what with that spooky date on the calendar! This calls for HUMOR! So, I scoured the net to find a few different items to amuse you today.
First up, the latest funny picture from the internet. It’s supposed to be a lesson in applied geometry but I think it’s a grocery bag boy’s worst nightmare:
Wow, someone has too much time on their hands! Ok! Moving on…
In your real estate search, did you ever look for something…different? I’ve found two interesting sites for you to browse. One is this cute site, which documents an older womans’ desire to build her own house. Then for those of you that just gotta have something out of this world, how about a missile silo? I can’t think of anything more secure than that to weather Friday
the 13th!
And if you run out of real estate reading options, I found this staggering list of 750 (and Read more:Cleanup
Neighborhood Profile: The River Club 2007-04-13 15:30:36 The River
Club
The River Club subdivision is unlike any neighborhood in North Augusta. It is situated along the banks of the beautiful Savannah River, and boasts a golf course designed by internationally acclaimed golf course architect Jim Fazio.
River Club is located just off of East Buena Vista Avenue in North Augusta- and offers immediate access to the Augusta Georgia city center via the 13th Street Bridge. This neighborhood offers two downtowns for the price of one!
This makes it an ideal location for access to Augusta’s MCG, University, and VA hospitals.
The main roads in The River Club are East Shoreline Drive, River Club Lane, and the entrance formed by Riverside Boulevard.
All homes on East Shoreline Drive offer views of the River, and those on the west side of the street have direct dock access to the Savannah River. From many of these riverfront homes, the Augusta River walk and Amphitheater is within view. You can enjoy evening concerts on the river year ‘roun Read more:Neighborhood
Neighborhood Profile: Savannah Barony 2007-04-11 15:44:03 Savannah Barony
An upscale neighborhood in Aiken County, Savannah Barony is located in a scenic area near the Savannah River. This community was designed by Mr. Robert Marvin, a world renowned landscape architect, to help preserve the unique beauty of this spot next to the Savannah River. House values typically range in the 300’s-500’s. These homes have 3 to 4 bedrooms or more, 2500+ square feet of living space, and rich interior finishing. At Savannah Barony each home is architecturally reviewed to ensure the tasteful blending of the homes with the natural setting. In preserving the natural terrain, Savannah Barony provides picturesque common areas with walking trails and access to the river. If you are looking for an address to impress the neighbors, this is it!
Savannah Barony is located along the riverfront on the North Augusta SC side of the Savannah River. The entrance is to your left immediately before reaching Interstate 20 when traveling North on Martintown Road. T Read more:Neighborhood
, Savannah
A short history of Bettis Academy and Junior College 2007-04-09 15:39:54 My father took me to see the ruins of Bettis Academy
when I was very young. I found myself looking at a field of wild hay, looking at old building foundations, wondering what was so special about it. He was always interested in local history- but I don’t remember much about what he told me about Bettis, other than he said it was an all-black school from the early 1900’s.
The former Bettis Academy lies on Bettis Academy Road between Augusta Road (Highway 25) and Ascauga Lake Road. It was established by Reverend Alexander Bettis in 1881 to provide basic education for former slaves. The Reverend himself was a former slave and could neither read nor write, but he raised $300 through his Mt. Canaan Church to buy the land and build the school.
A boarding institution with a strong emphasis on religion, Bettis Academy initially focused on education in the skilled trades, but there was also a curriculum in education. Graduated students often went on to have informal careers as Read more:Junior
, College
The Ascauga Lake Road Tale 2007-04-08 17:12:33 I have a bit of local trivia that not many people are aware of, even people that have grown up here… ‘Ascauga’ Lake Road doesn’t have it’s origins as some old Native American name- it’s an acronym:
AikenSouthCarolinaAUgustaGeorgiA
I’m not sure who originally came up with the word. I can date it from before the 1940’s, as the former owner of Ascauga Lake told me that the road and pond had that name when he newly arrived in the area after returning to the States from World War II. Ascauga Lake itself used to be a private swimming area before it closed in the late 1980’s. And now you know!
South Carolina’s Sabal Palmetto 2007-04-07 01:15:18 Did you ever wonder about the Palmetto Tree on the SouthCarolina
state flag? On a trip yesterday to Florence, we started chatting about it in the car, and I am embarrassed to say, none of us knew much about it. Three native South Carolinians! How awful! I just had to research it when I got back to North Augusta!
Well, that stately palm has been on our flag since 1861, but it turns out the Palmetto has only been the state tree of South Carolina
since 1939. The Palmetto also appears on the state Seal.
The Palmetto is a type of palm adapted for survival in heavy winds, and as such develops a very strong root system below ground and a soft and willowy trunk above ground. Also known by it’s scientific name Sabal Palmetto, it grows in the coastal areas of South Carolina and Florida. Some examples can get to as much as 65 feet tall, but normally averages only around 40 feet.
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Home Life Expectancy 2007-04-05 21:23:45 Ever wondered how long your roof, refrigerator, walls, or deck are expected to last? Well, Bank of America Home Equity and the National Association of Home Builders have done a study to find out about how long components in your home are designed to last.
Among the findings of the study:
* Appliances. Of the major appliances in a home, gas ranges have the longest life expectancy, at 15 years. Dryers and refrigerators last about 13 years. Appliances with the shortest life spans are: compactors (six years), dishwashers (nine years) and microwave ovens (nine years). Some appliances don’t meet their life expectancy, however, because changes in styling, technology and consumer preferences may make newer products more desirable. Also, how long they last depends on how much they are used.
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How to subscribe to an RSS feed- with screenshots 2007-04-04 20:13:33 Some of our readers may have noticed that funny icon and the text ‘posts’ located in the upper right corner of our web pages. What is that thing anyway? Well, that symbol indicates an RSS Feed.
RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication, and it’s a way to push content from a website using feeds to a RSS ‘aggregator’ of your choice. With feeds, you can consolidate content from your favorite websites, right to your desktop, without going to each of those sites to see if they’ve added new articles!
RSS is best described as a way to build your own electronic newspaper, where all the articles are sent to you digitally, and you get to pick the article sources.
The Elegant Augusta GA Real Estate Blog offers two types of feeds- you can ‘feed on posts’ which are articles like you are reading now, or you can ‘feed on comments’ which lets you read comments posted with a particular article. This last type of feed can be useful if you&r
Yang Wu’s Folly 2007-04-02 18:12:02 Poor Yang Wu. You remember that old slogan, “When you get to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on”? In this case, Yang Wu may have to double up on his knots and hang on extra tight.
Yang Wu is a 51 year old resident of Chongqing, which is a heavily populated area in central China. He and his wife, along with approximately 280 other families, were offered resettlement packages in order to make way for a large commercial development. He had been offered space on two floors of the new building, or alternatively a cash buyout. While it’s apparently not known what exactly the developer offered him, his current home was valued at about 2.5 million yuan (about $325,000).
Here’s the problem- the developer refused to wait for Yang Wu and started construction. Yang Wu has been living without electricity or gas for two years now.
Yang Wu’s home has been called the ‘hardest nail house in China’ because of a Chinese proverb that refers to peopl Read more:Folly
BINGO! 2007-04-01 20:34:22 As a member of the MCG Red Wagon Society, one of the things that I get an opportunity to do is play bingo with the kids. Each month about 3-4 of the Red Wagon members gather on the fifth floor lobby of MCG and play ‘medical bingo’ with the children. This is not only fun for us and the kids, it also gives the children the chance to learn about the medical equipment they come in contact with everyday.
All of the kids get the opportunity to win a few prizes and have a little fun during a time that is tough for them. One of the highlights is watching the parents and relatives having just as much fun as the young ones. It gives them an opportunity to forget about why they are there, and watch their child be a kid again. Last Wednesday I teamed up with a little girl named Mariah and her mother. Mariah walked out of the bingo game with a Barbie, a drawing set, and 2 My Little Ponies. The toys are from our February toy drive. Thank you to those that generously donated toy
SC Real Estate Broker’s License 2007-04-17 01:26:11 It’s official! I am now a licensed South Carolina Real EstateBroker
! I received the card over the weekend. While I knew from checking online that my license had been issued, I couldn’t really call myself a real estate broker until I had the license in hand. I’ve posted a scan of it just in case you wondered what one might look like:
Since I am now a real estate broker in SC, technically I’m no longer a real estate salesperson. To be a Real Estate
Broker (at least in South Carolina anyway) you have to have been a licensed real estate agent for a minimum of three years; have considerably more training than what is required for an agent; and pass a licensing exam that documents that training. In addition, I can now employ other agents and operate my own brokerage if I wanted to. I’m happy with Meybohm Realtors, so I’m not going anywhere, though.
To show you the originality of the Real Estate commission, here is a copy of my old real estate agen Read more:License
Helpful North Augusta phone numbers postcard 2007-04-17 14:50:14 Lydia Taylor- like most realtors in the Augusta
real estate market, tries to get her name out there as much as possible. Here is a postcard she sent out recently that I thought was pretty nice. You can either click on the picture thumbnail to get a larger image, or you can click on the link below to download the picture file.
Helpful North
Augusta phone
numbers
5 Home Rental Investment Tips 2007-04-22 23:39:24 Shopping for rental homes is a whole different experience than shopping for your own home. In this case, a cool calculated approach brings dividends. Take a no-nonsense, logical and informed approach and you too can be rental home guru.
Don’t let emotion get in the way!
When looking for rental homes, avoid looking for character, charm, or curb appeal. You are planning to make an investment- you are not going to live there. One of the biggest mistakes buyers make is asking themselves if they would live there, when they should be asking “Can I keep tenants there?”
Look in areas you are familiar with!
Local knowledge is a plus. If you are know the traffic patterns, local employers, general level of crime, etc., you are much more likely to avoid buying a rent house in an area that may be difficult to keep rented. Areas with college students are a plus, but keep in mind students are also transient tenants.
Look for houses already rented!
Ok, this may seem obvious, bu Read more:Rental
The Haunted Pillar of Augusta Georgia 2007-04-27 17:39:28 At the corner of Broad and Fifth streets stands one of AugustaGeorgia
’s most famous relics. A humble 10 foot tall piece of concrete Augustans call The HauntedPillar
.
The story of the pillar got its start way back in 1830. That year a new Farmer’s Market was built over what was then called Center Street. The pillar was part of a row of columns that held up the large front Greek portico. And so it stood, until a freak tornado struck downtown Augusta in February of 1878. The entire farmer’s market was destroyed, except for the one remaining column.
Now tornados are rather rare on the east coast, especially in February. The legend began…Local lore claims that if you happen to touch the pillar, you will be struck dead.
The most commonly heard tale is that a traveling preacher, angry at being prevented from giving a sermon at the market, cursed the building, “A great wind will destroy this place except for one pillar… and whomever tries to remove this remaining pi
The State of the Union in Real Estate Blogging 2007-04-27 04:27:00 Our local readers know by now that the Elegant Augusta GA Real Estate
Blog is an authority on local interest topics, but what about on the national level? Have you looked around for decent reading on real estate in general?
Well, I am sad to say the list of good blogs is short, but that the creme of the crop is really really good!
I’ve found the Real Estate
Tomato to be a really nice blog. It’s not real estate-centric, which is nice. It’s just a well written, well thought out blog that tries to help us bloggers in the real estate trenches be better bloggers. The site design is amazing- the theme is unique, eye-catching, and has a flair which makes visiting the tomato a feast for the eyes.
Another strong online offering is Sellsius real estate blog. The content is definitely there. The posting frequency is high enough that if you miss a day or two you’ll be missing a lot- it’s almost more of a newspaper than a blog. The writers really love the real e Read more:State
, Union
, Blogging
Open House - Woodlawn Drive, North Augusta - 4/29/07 2007-04-27 02:14:55 This Sunday, the 29th of April I will be hosting an Open House
at a cute ranch home for sale on Woodlawn Drive in NorthAugusta
. One of the nicest streets in downtown North Augusta, Woodlawn is located right off Martintown Road.
The home is 1700 square feet and also has a double car attached garage. The kitchen has a wonderful mix of hardwood paneling and tile. There are 3 bedrooms, with 2 full baths, and all new carpet in the bedrooms. The house lists for $154,900.
I look forward to seeing you this Sunday 2pm - 4pm! If you need help finding it, check out the Google Map, or feel free to give me a call on the cell 270-5005!
The listing appointment from…THE TWILIGHT ZONE 2007-04-25 12:40:40 OK. Here’s the situation. As Lydia Taylor’s assistant, sometimes I’m lucky enough to be sent out on assignment. Today, LT has sent me away from the command post (EARE HQ) to check out a potential listing.
On the way, I notice that somehow&hellip
;the line painters just don’t want to stay around to do a good job…Hmm.
All right, I can ignore that. It’s just a little bit of tax money wastin’. Anyhow, I just need to take a turn here at the airstrip at the end of town, and I’ll be right at the house. Wait! What’s that?
OK, now that is seriously weird!! I’ll just get to the house, make my measurements, get the property disclosure filled out, take a tour to see the property, and get out of there… How hard can it be? Ah, I’m here now. Wow, look at that baby in the yard!
Wow that little guy is ready for anything!! “What’s that, you say the homeowner is filling out the property disclosure in the ba Read more:appointment
Does a swimming pool add value to a home? 2007-04-24 19:12:27 We get asked that question a lot around here and the simple answer is no. The majority of home buyers do not want a pool and have no interest in maintaining one. This type of home buyer will actively avoid buying a house with a pool. There are a small group of people that enjoy swimming pools and a home with a pool would be counted as plus, but even for these buyers it’s not a ‘must have’ option.
If you are considering adding a pool to enhance your home’s value, please don’t. Spend your home improvement money on a new fireplace, kitchen and bath upgrade, or a larger deck. These type of home upgrades have a broad appeal to all types of home buyers. Even better is that those home improvements are less costly in terms of initial expense and long-term maintenance.
We all love a good swim, and they do look inviting during the long, hot summers we have here!! But you should not expect to take that money you spent on the pool with you when sell your home.
Fire! 2007-04-30 03:48:47 There was a lot of excitement in the neighborhood today. The two houses next to me had an (apparently) smoldering trash fire reignite and burn a corner of both properties. One of the houses is for sale, and they had just put up a nice wooden privacy fence around the back yard. I’m sorry to say about 4 sections of that fence are gone tonight. Luckily the neighborhood kids raised the alarm and neighbors put the flames out with water hoses before they could spread too far. By the time the local volunteer firefighters had arrived the fire had mostly been extinguished. The homeowners of neither house were home at the time.
My husband and I were talking about how terrible it would be to lose your house to a fire. There are a very few family disasters that could approach the type of emotional despair that must come with losing all your belongings to a fire. I’m glad to say this one did not go that far. Special thanks to those kids that saw the smoke and let all the homeo
Neighborhood Profile: Jones Creek Golf Club 2007-04-28 21:04:37 Jones Creek subdivision is set around a beautiful golf course in Evans, GA not more than fifteen minutes from downtown Augusta, GA.
Jones Creek is located in the corner created by the intersection of Evans to Lock Road and Fury’s Ferry. On the other corner is the edge of Westlake Country Club. Only 6 miles away is the prestigious Augusta National Golf Club
. It can certainly be said that this portion of Evans contains the most desirable homes in the area!
To enter into Jones Creek using the front entrance, approach from the direction of the Riverwatch Parkway. Once on Fury’s Ferry Road you would take a left onto Evans to Locks Road. Only a few hundred yards down you will find Jones Creek on your right.
There is a back entrance farther down Fury’s Ferry Road on your left. This entrance is Hammond’s Ferry Road.
Google Map to the clubhouse.
Jones Creek Golf Club has an 18-hole, 6900-yard semi-private course. It was designed and built in 1985 by Rees Jones and Tom Fazio. T Read more:Neighborhood
Elegant Augusta GA Real Estate Blog Traffic Will Spike this Summer 2007-05-01 19:23:56 The end of April is here and the stats are now recorded for our 3rd full month in operation. The website traffic has picked up slightly over 25% each month. This website will serve well over 20,000 pages in May. That may not be a lot to the big boys, but for us it’s pretty good. We are very proud of the constant increase in visitors- as that tells us we are doing something right.
Due to the ’sandbox’ effect that Google puts in for new sites competing for competitive search terms (hey, ‘Augusta
Georgia Real Estate
’ is a pretty popular search these days!) this site doesn’t yet show up yet for a typical Google search for real estate in our area. That disappoints us a little bit, but it ranks for a whole lot of other good searches, and boy does that generate traffic! We will just keep plugging away, trying to bring relevant useful content to our readers. That’s the point- we want to write articles that you want to read, that are useful to y Read more:Elegant
, Spike
, Summer
, Real Estate
, Blog Traffic
Friday Comedy Relief 2007-05-05 00:16:59 This week, Augusta is going to the dogs!
Everyone have a wonderful, and safe, weekend!
Read more:Friday
, Comedy
SC Realtor is a Blogger to Watch 2007-05-04 18:57:41 I’d like to point out a fellow South Carolina Realtor
that’s doing an outstanding job with her Bluffton SC Real Estate Blog. Stacy Macioszek is an agent with Cora Bett Thomas Realty Company.
Stacy is working on a groundbreaking set of posts where one of her clients is writing about their home search. While privacy and disclosure forbids us knowing much more about this mystery writer, we do know that ‘Jim’ is one of her clients looking for real estate in the Bluffton/Hilton Head Island area. Jim has volunteered to write about his experiences and his home search on Stacy’s blog. As you might imagine, it takes a very confident Realtor to have a client report on her activities through her own website!
This is an example of a Realtor using the internet in an interesting new way. It is my opinion that today’s market requires a web-savvy, technologically sophisticated real estate agent who can leverage technology and information to find the best p Read more:Blogger
Neighborhood Profile: West Lake Country Club 2007-05-04 12:36:09 West Lake Country
Club is the oldest and most prominent golf community in Evans Georgia. West Lake has a front entrance on Stevens Creek Road, and a back entrance on Fury’s Ferry Road. (Google Map). A gated community, West Lake has over 1000 homes that have been built there since the first home broke ground back in 1969.
The golf course came first- West Lake has a 6,876 yard 18-hole private golf course designed by Ellis Maples in 1967. The course was completed and opened for play in 1969. Back in those early days, access to the clubhouse was by dirt road. The course has come a long way since then and is now perennially voted #1 for Best Private Golf Course by Augusta Magazine.
The clubhouse is now undergoing a major renovation that should be complete by fall of 2007. Members of the club also enjoy access to the 12 tennis courts, an Olympic size swimming pool, fitness center, and fine dining.
West Lake has grown large enough now that there are several areas to the neighborho Read more:Neighborhood
Contact Form Down…oh no! 2007-05-04 02:59:51 We noticed today (after several test trials) that for whatever reason the contact form page on the site just…quit. Lydia is very upset that people may have contacted her and that she will not respond to their messages. Meanwhile, we’ve taken the form down until we can figure out what is going on.
In any event, she is hopeful that if you have tried to contact her by using the form, please accept her apologies- she may not have received your messages.
She can be reached by the phone #’s in the sidebar, or by email at ltaylor AT meybohm DOT com. We sincerely apologize.
Open House with Views of the Savannah River 2007-05-04 01:00:28 This Sunday, May 6th, from 2-4pm, I will be hosting an open house at 2 Indies Landing (Google Map) in North Augusta. Sitting on 3/4 of an acre, this great 4 bedroom, 3 bath home is located in a private cul-de-sac neighborhood and boasts scenic views of the SavannahRiver
. It is also within walking distance to the Greeneway. This home lists at $349,900.
To see this great home for sale, turn onto Hammond Dr from Martintown Road, take a right onto Stanton, a left onto Cypress, turn right onto Riveroak, and finally left into Indies Landing.
For more information or help finding this attractive home, please call me on my cell, 803-270-5005.
Read more:House
Renovated Rappers Residence 2007-05-03 19:13:02 Farmington Connecticut might be the last place to find a rappers’ mansion, but find one you can. A sprawling 52-room, 48,000 square foot estate is up for sale- after having been renovated by the ’singer’ 50 cent.
The home was once owned by notorious celebrity boxer/rapist Mike Tyson. In a move that had real estate investors everywhere shuddering, 50 cent paid $4.1 million for the property in September 2003, and then spent another $6 million renovating it.
Curt Clemens, owner of Century 21 Clemens & Sons in Hartford, was quoted as saying, “He’s put a lot into it, and it’s all very tasteful, except the stripper poles.”
You forgot to mention the helicopter pad, Curt.
Read more:Rappers
, Residence
Palmetto Parkway Spyshots 2007-05-07 12:30:22 An extension to Bobby Jones Expressway is currently progressing through South Carolina on it’s way to an intersection with Interstate 20 just East of Exit 5. Georgia construction was completed many years ago, running from I-20 west of Augusta, around South of the City, and ending near Bush Field Airport. Just recently the construction continued into South Carolina all the way to Highway 1. Now the intention is to close the half loop by continuing Bobby Jones all the way back to Interstate 20 again.
A roving (and I mean 4-wheel drive kind of roving) correspondent took these photos of the North Augusta construction of the Bobby Jones extension on to Interstate 20. If you are on dial-up, we apologize, it might take these pictures a while to load.
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“Augusta’s Ghost Town” - The lost village of New Savannah 2007-05-10 23:07:59 Few locals know that approximately 15 miles below the rapids of the Savannah
River, near the opening of Butler Creek, lies the forgotten remains of New Savannah Georgia.
In 1740, a tribe of Chickasaw Indians led by Chief Squirrel King moved from the Horse Creek Valley of what is now Aiken County in South Carolina. They chose to settle on the Georgia side of the river. Mostly peaceful farmers, by the start of the Revolution the tiny Indian town had a population of approximately 150 individuals.
As the Revolution closed a tobacco inspection station was set up in New Savannah. Leaf grown in the surrounding areas of Richland County and the Edgefield District (present day Aiken County) was packed in wooded barrels and transported to the town. The Georgia leaf arrived via Tobacco Road (hence the origin of the present day road) en route to the small hamlet. After inspection the barrels were sent downstream to the port of Savannah by barge.
ABOVE: A map of the Augusta
area, from 1780, s Read more:Ghost
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