Some Fernley builders hold off new construction

You can't blame Jolie and Dan Anderson for feeling a little worried.

Their real estate firm, The Realty House Anderson & Associates, sells new houses in Fernley's Donner Trails Estates subdivision for developer JKB/Paramount Homes Nevada.

Business at the large development on the east side of town has been strong enough for the builder to introduce new floor plans and begin work on new model homes.

But the couple has noticed that some of the other developments in town have become mighty quiet.

"You go out there, and there's weeds growing all around those homes," Jolie Anderson said. "It's scary."

There is a supply-and-demand imbalance in this north Lyon County town that mixes a backlog of completed houses with a dearth of homebuyers.

As a result, some builders have stopped building until the equation comes back into line.

For instance, R&K Homes of Reno has four active subdivisions in Fernley: Solera and Southwest Meadows on the west side of town, Summer Breeze and Autumn Winds on the east side.

However, most of the current activity is not visible from the street. "We sold seven or eight homes last month, and we just had some dramatic price reductions," said Shana Rudd, a Realtor with Coldwell Banker Village Realty, who is in charge of sales for the four developments.

Even so, there are more than 30 completed homes available in the four neighborhoods, including model homes, she said.

So, R&K is holding off construction of any more houses until it sells enough of the ones it has on hand, Rudd said.

Not that builders are abandoning the area. An expected increase in jobs at the Tahoe Reno Industrial Center, combined with the Fernley presence of retail giants Wal-Mart and Lowe's, has developers and Realtors focusing on the future.

Matthews Homes, for example, had 65 undeveloped lots in its Sundance neighborhood at last year's end.

But the builder sold those lots to Verner Homes Nevada, stepping away to concentrate on two new subdivisions it wanted to build, said Linda Lawton, owner of L.L. Realty, which serves as Matthews' sales force.

And the builder still has another existing neighborhood, Ponderosa, on Fernley's east side.

The Andersons also are pinning high hopes on the industrial center, having recently been named its exclusive real-estate services firm and given the opportunity to serve as the on-site point of contact for housing information.

"We'll be showing people why owning a home really does work to their advantage," Jolie Anderson said.

The Fernley market finds itself in the same bad news/good news state that other areas of northern Nevada are facing these days.

Since the beginning of the year, Lawton has sold 42 new and resale homes, with sale prices down as low as $129,000.

"The people who have existing homes have lost a lot of equity," Lawton said, "but it (the price drop) has drawn in the buyers."

Other economic challenges have hampered the job of selling homes in Fernley, particularly the rocketing increase in gas prices.

In the past, a majority of homebuyers came from Reno to take advantage of Fernley's lower housing costs.

"We used to say, 'Drive a little, save a lot,'" said Dan Anderson. "But with $4-a-gallon gas, guess what? The savings aren't as big as they were."

Then again, the savings seem to be big enough to draw buyers in from Fallon, which is only slightly closer to Fernley than Reno is.

"We are getting some from Fallon, but then again, those are people from the Navy base who don't want to live right where they work," Dan Anderson said.