El Paso builders' Treasure Tour aimed to rev up new home sales

Edgar Montiel, owner of Palo Verde Homes, stood Wednesday in front of a model home on the 13400 block of Halifax in far East El Paso County. Palo Verde will have three homes, including the 148,450 home to the left of Montiel, on the Treasure Tour of Homes, which begins Friday. It's being held by the El Paso Association of Builders to stimulate sagging new home sales. (PHOTO COURTESY OF PALO VERDE HOMES)

Seventeen El Paso home builders will showcase more than 40 of their homes in the next 10 days during the Treasure Tour of Homes in hopes of revving up sagging new home sales.

"This has been a tough year," said Ray Adauto, executive vice president of the El Paso Association of Builders, the local home builders group, which organized the homes' tour.

Tightened loan requirements, rising new-construction costs, and no more economic stimulus from the now-completed Fort Bliss expansion have combined to make new homes a tougher sell than in some past years, he said.

The free, self-guided Treasure Tour of Homes, which begins Friday and runs through Nov. 2, is aimed at stimulating the new home market by giving potential buyers a chance to see a variety of homes throughout the El Paso area and provides chances to win a list of prizes, Adauto said.

Financing a new home can be even more difficult than financing a resale, or used, home because rising permitting and construction costs have new home prices rising, Adauto noted.

The median, or market midpoint price, for a new, El Paso home in the first nine months of the year was $167,275, and $124,000 for a resale home, according to data from the Greater El Paso Association of Realtors.

The number of resale homes sold in El Paso County in the first nine months of the year increased 10.3 percent from a year ago to 3,176, the Realtors' data show.

The Realtors association only gets reports for a fraction of new home sales in El Paso County. Its partial data show new home sales declined 5.8 percent in the first nine months of the year compared to a year ago to 1,362 sales.

The El Paso home builders group does not report new home sales data. But Adauto said the number of building permits issued in El Paso city limits is down 18 to 20 percent so far this year.

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El Paso builders' Treasure Tour aimed to rev up new home sales