Las Vegas Luxury Real Estate: Luxury Las Vegas Homes
Las Vegas luxury real estate has certainly changed over the years.
In the early mid-90's there were potentially 4 or 5 Las Vegas luxury homes a year
that sold with a price tag of 1 million dollars or more. I just
looked on the computer here in October 2005, and there are 630 luxury Las Vegas homes
that are available for 1 million dollars or more, and 720 luxury Las Vegas real estate
properties that are in pending or have closed within the last year that
fit the criteria of a million dollars or more. Certainly, part
of that is just prices rising in housing in general across the country,
but I think in many other cities the proportion has not changed as much
as it has in Las Vegas in terms of Las Vegas luxury real estate. A lot
of that has to do with the change in the sophistication of the buyers
within Las Vegas . Years ago when we were first getting involved
in Las Vegas real estate, for example, the quality of the restaurants
was seemingly judged by the volume of the food that it served,
and we're talking in terms of the buffets being the destination of choice.
Within the last decade, many of the top restauratneurs in the United
States have established a presence here at many of the casinos. Back
then, most casinos had one gourmet room, whereas today, Las Vegas hotels like the
Wynn, Caesar's, Bellagio, the Venetian, Mandalay Bay, Paris and several
others have multiple restaurants, any of which would have been considered,
the "gourmet room" a decade or so ago.
Education is another major thing that has changed since we became Las
Vegas realtors in the late 80's. Back in the late 80's UNLV, the University
of Nevada at Las Vegas, was basically known as a basketball school with
very little academic accreditation. That has certainly changed over the
years with some of it's departments achieving national recognition. High
school wise, some of the schools that were considered as some of the top high schools in Las Vegas,
when we moved here in the late 80's, would now be considered toward the middle
or the bottom of the pack. When Green Valley High School, opened in the mid
90's, it was on the cover of USA Today. There are several other Las Vega high schools
that are equally as fine as Green Valley High School and the corresponding
middle schools and elementary schools that feed into some of our high schools
are just as excellent. The private education is from Las Vegas schools such as Warren
Walker and the Meadows, these are schools that anyone would be proud to have their
children attend no matter where it was in the country. So education has notched
itself up .
Probably the biggest change in the Los Vegas luxury real estate market in
the last decade or so has been the amount of communities that a luxury real
estate buyer can choose from. When we were moving here the area close
to downtown, Rancho Circle was considered the luxury real estate area of
Las Vegas and still is a beautiful area. However; right around 1990, Spanish
Trails was getting started, The Fountains, which is a quality area in town in the Green Valley
area was just getting started, and a few other Las Vegas real estate areas around Green Valley; Quail
Ridge, and Quail Estates, where very much coming into their own. Now there
are too many Las Vegas luxury real estate areas to list. Summerlin, certainly comes to mind. Something that
was started in the early '90s and has a variety of Las Vegas luxury real estate locations.
In Green Valley , The Fountains have taken off, Anthem, Seven Hills, and many
other areas have become luxury Las Vegas real estate destinations. For the international
jet set types, Lake Las Vegas has become a destination of second and even third homes.
Luxury Las Vegas homes around golf courses have become a very big feature,
TPC at Summerland, Anthem Country Club, Rio Secco Golf
Course in Seven Hills and many, many others have become areas where people
are very comfortable with luxury real estate being built . Many new home builders
are building luxury real estate in Las Vegas . Christopher Holmes, Toll Brothers,
US Homes, Pulte and several others come to mind when you think about luxury
Las Vegas real estate and new home builders in Las Vegas and Henderson, Nevada.
Another new las vegas development in the last few years has been the mid-rise
and the high-rise condominiums. Turnberry is probably the new
breed of luxury hi rises to get started here back around 10
years ago and the MGM residences started about 5 years ago. Now,
today, there are more than 50 projects actually being built with more
than 100 different models being offered, ranging in size from 500 square
foot studios to almost 10,000 square foot, three bedroom penthouses,
and prices ranging from the mid-100's for one or two of the studios to
well over $6 million for some of the most extravagant. It brought
in a lot of different players into Las Vegas real estatemarket, for example, Donald Trump
and Ivana Trump are both building here at this point in time. There
are more than 100 other Las Vegas real estate projects that are on the drawing board right
now. Some of these will come to fruition. The amount of dollars
per square foot on this luxury Las Vegas real estate is higher than the typical home might
be. The high-rises seem to be being bought mainly by speculators and
by a comparative few owner/occupants. Certainly there are businesses
that want to have a corporate retreat in Las Vegas, but mainly
it seems that they are being bought by speculators who are hoping to
flip them for a short term profit. That seems a little bit risky
to us in a couple of ways. Number one, most of the buyers prefer
to buy brand new, thinking that there is more upside potential there,
and so when somebody is trying to flip them, who are they selling
them to? Number two, a certain percentage of these projects will
never get completed leading to at best a missed opportunity while your
money was tied up, and at worst some sort of difficulty getting your
earnest money returned to you. We're happy to help you with
the Las Vegas real estate product, but want you to go into it with open eyes.
Visit our Las Vegas Nevada Home Search section and discover the luxury Las Vegas home that will make you and your family feel comfortable and at home.