GarCo hits $1 billion in real-estate sales

With real-estate sales in Pitkin County surpassing $2.5 billion in 2006, Garfield County made a run for the money last year too, breaking the $1 billion mark for the first time.

According to a report by Land Title Guarantee Company, the dollar volume of real estate transactions in GarCo was $1.04 billion in 2006, a 21 percent increase from 2005, when $855 million worth of real estate transactions took place. A total of 2,852 units were sold, 9 percent more than the previous year.

December ended on a high note, with $104 million in sales, which was up 32 percent over 2005 in dollar volume but slightly less in the number of units. The largest part of that volume took place in Carbondale, which saw $836,000 in sales that month.

Dollar volume has increased rapidly in GarCo over the last few years. In 2003, there were $439 million in real estate sales, then $600 million in 2004 -- last year's transactions represented a nearly threefold increase in dollar volume.

Comparatively, Pitkin County had both a double-digit percentage increase in dollar volume (26 percent) and a double-digit percentage decrease in transaction volume in December, showing that prices continue to go up, according to Land Title.

Pitkin County's $2.64 billion in real-estate sales is an almost 18 percent increase over the previous year -- and 132 percent higher than in 2003.

Not surprisingly, Aspen had the lion's share of the dollar volume in December -- 57 percent, compared to 36 percent of the number of transactions.

Last year also saw only a 2 percent increase in dollar volume from fractional sales: $181 million as opposed to $178 million in 2005.