Regardless of your investment preferences, whether they are primarily geared toward corporate stocks and bonds or real estate based, diversification is the best road to take to insure asset protection during volatile marketplace upheavals. In other words, as the old and time-proven saying goes, “don’t put all of your eggs in one basket.”

Best advice to any investor; know the marketplace you are playing in. If you are not thoroughly familiar with the rules of the game, you are assuredly destined to lose.

Certainly, no one, no matter how skilled an investor one may be- and we have said this time and again- knows everything, and if you are playing the real estate game, incorporate a team of specialists as your guides and advisers. As any successful investor will assure you, it takes a team effort to succeed.

There are many ways to diversify a real estate portfolio, and the investor should –after careful analysis – choose the path that best suits present and future market conditions and projections.

Among the many and most common real estate diversification investments are:

• Purchasing and selling or renting high-end properties; estate homes, luxury condos, etc.
• Buying, repairing and renting or selling handy-man specials
• Apartment complexes
• Condo conversions
• Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs)
• Real estate mutual funds
• Real estate hedge funds
• Real estate related stocks
• Raw land
• Commercial property

Diversification allows the investor to ride out a down cycle in a particular market, with asset loss minimized or even neutralized by an up cycle in other real estate investments.

Take for example, what is happening in today’s marketplace. An investor whose specialty is strictly geared toward the buying and selling of single-family homes is faced with falling property values due to a huge glut of available inventory, mostly consisting of distressed properties, and with no immediate prospects of this inventory diminishing to any great degree for some time.

However, an investor for example, who buys and sells homes and has additionally invested for the long term in rental properties, including single family residences and apartment complexes, will have the benefit of continued cash flow from rentals.

Investors who have concentrated strictly on one aspect of real estate investment are in trouble when their investments hit a severe down cycle, since these investors have no immediate options to fall back on.

The investor with a skilled real estate agent as part of his/her advisory team is in an excellent position to intelligently forecast near future  market trends in some instances, and make the kind of investments that will maximize revenues and minimize loss.

Although these examples are just simplified versions of complex issues, the wisdom of diversification is obvious.

There is no doubt that the overall quality of a school district has a definitive impact on home values. In fact, the one of the most prominent reasons for families with school-age children to choose or reject a particular Las Vegas Home is based less upon the likes and dislikes of the home, and more upon the known quality or lack thereof of the school the property is zoned.

It’s an absolute fact that the market value of residential homes located within the jurisdiction of a quality school remain consistently higher than the value of similar homes in a less desirable school zone.

Often, buyers will be willing to pay premium prices for a home within a high ranked school zone, which is a primary reason for such a home to command top dollar.

Even in a market of declining home values, such as we are experiencing today, homes within the better school zones are holding their value far better than most.

A home within a school zone recognized for its consistency in quality education is often considered more desirable than a home that is perhaps located more conveniently to shopping, entertainment and business districts, for example.

Sixth largest in the United States, the Clark County School District has a number of schools that have rated among the nation’s best. Green Valley High School has, in fact, been proudly ranked among the top ten high schools in the country.

Detailed information about schools in the Clark County School District, as well as charter schools, can be viewed by parents and guardians through required annual reports. These reports are also used by Las Vegas school teachers and administrators to help develop academic achievement programs designed to increase the learning skills of all students.

Additionally, a Magnet School Program developed by the Clark County School District provides students with the opportunity to attend schools offering unique educational programs.

Under these programs, parents and their children have the opportunity to choose which of the Magnet School’s specific offerings would best suit the child’s particular interests.

Important consideration should be given to the fact that there is always a possibility that school boundary changes could occur if, for instance, a particular school is growing rapidly and is near or over capacity.

A new subdivision located near an established neighborhood could possibly stress the capacity of the adjacent schools and cause a school boundary shift, and although homes in a good school zone can often command selling prices of twenty to thirty percent higher than similar homes in a lesser school zone, a school boundary shift which would put the home in a less desirable school zone would most certainly negatively affect market values.

What can you do? Evaluate all of the factors involved, and just try to make the most intelligent choice possible. Remember, in the real estate marketplace, as in life, nothing is guaranteed, and change is inevitable..

If you are looking to purchase a Las Vegas Home within a particular school zone and have any questions, feel free to give us a call at 702.376.0088.