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00000176-d8fc-dce8-adff-faff71570000The Boise-metro market was hardest hit in Idaho's housing crisis, with foreclosures concentrated in Ada and Canyon Counties.Idaho’s housing boom was centered around its two main metropolitan areas, Boise and Coeur d’Alene.John Starr of the global real estate company Colliers International had a front-row seat as capital poured into the local housing markets in the years preceding the bust.When he thinks of the early 2000s, he remembers watching land prices rise with demand, and house lots shrink. What the area wound up with, he says, were more and more subdivisions, packed tight with houses.Census data show that the state’s population grew by more than 28 percent from 1990 to 2000, and by more than 20 percent from 2000 to 2010. Starr said that's due in large part to growth at Micron Technology. That growth, in turn, fueled Idaho's housing boom.“The reason we were doubling the national average growth rate was we were moving in a whole bunch of people that we couldn’t produce here in Idaho, namely electrical engineers and so forth to work at Micron. The data points that people were looking at that were helping them make decisions about coming to Boise and deploying capital and building and helping us grow – those data points were skewed.” - John Starr, Colliers InternationalAccording to Metrostudy, a housing and data information company, Boise’s housing market began to bottom out in 2009.

Ada County Median Home Values Increase At A 'Sustainable' Pace

Adam Cotterell
/
Boise State Public Radio

Ada County homeowners are receiving annual notices in the mail with their new property values. The county assessors office says the median value of a home went up 5.8 percent between 2013 and 2014.

County Assessor Bob McQuade says the new median increase is tempered compared to the growth seen last year, which was a jump of about 14.5 percent. That means half of Ada County home values went more than 5.8 percent and half went up less.  

McQuade says this year's numbers are sustainable and healthy, and indicate that a housing bubble isn’t likely.

"We're seeing three to five percent annualized increases, to me that's just nice sustainable growth," says McQuade. "There's just a lot of stability in the market right now."

However, it could mean property tax increases. McQuade says that's up to Ada County cities.

“If everybody kept their budgets the same, everyone’s taxes would stay about the same. But budgets can increase up to three percent, so perhaps everyone could see about a three percent increase.”

He says Meridian home values grew at the slowest pace in the county, at just 2.64 percent. Eagle – which has been a leader in home values in years past – also slowed down. The new leader in home value growth is the Boise Bench, which saw an increase of 8.7 percent.

Find Frankie Barnhill on Twitter @FABarnhill

Copyright 2015 Boise State Public Radio

Frankie Barnhill was the Senior Producer of Idaho Matters, Boise State Public Radio's daily show and podcast.

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