MEMORIAL AREA
Idyllic Memorial has been, and probably always will be a great place to invest in real estate, but it’s an even better place to live – just ask the kids who grew up here, went off to premier universities, traveled the world and then returned to raise their families here. Memorial can be divided into 3 different markets – Close-In Memorial (basically east of Chimney Rock, west of 610, south of I-10 and north of Buffalo Bayou), the Memorial Villages (Hunters Creek, Piney Point, Hedwig and Bunker Hill) and West Memorial (basically Gessner west to Highway 6. Except for the area west of Eldridge, the homes in Memorial are zoned to acclaimed Spring Branch ISD schools, which is one of the primary draws for these areas.
MEMORIAL VILLAGES
As a child growing up in Hunters Creek Village, it never occurred to me how much appreciation our 2,960 SF ranch house circa 1952 on a half-acre lot on Bryn Mawr Circle would experience over the years. When I saw it sell in 2010 for lot value at $800,000, I recalled my father telling me that he bought it in 1965 for $37,500 and sold it in 1972 for $54,000. That 44% appreciation in 7 years sounded good, but 2,000% appreciation over 45 years sounds even better.
The Memorial Villages - Hunters Creek, Piney Point, Hedwig and Bunker Hill – each have their own city management, but share water, police and fire services. These neighborhoods were carved out of family farms that were sold to developers in the 1950s and 1960s to accommodate the need for suburban living in an expanding Houston. Despite the urban sprawl surrounding the Villages, they have been able to retain their rural feel with large wooded lots, good old fashioned ditches for rain drainage and minimal commercial properties. Hunters Creek and Piney Point have the larger 1+ acre lots with many of those backing to Buffalo Bayou as it winds through as the southern border to the Memorial Area.
According to HARMLS, there were 182 sales of single family homes in 2014 throughout the 4 villages, with a low of $695,000, a high of $11,980,000 and an average of $2,002,000 ($378/SF). Only 52 of these homes were built in the past 15 years. Although new construction is rampant in these areas, there are still many ranch, traditional, colonial and contemporary style homes that have been or will be remodeled by their new owners.