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Nominations sought for 10th Athena award

Henderson County News

Nashville Roadshow features classic country hits

Jason Petty and Katie Deal kick off the Flat Rock Playhouse Main Stage season next week with Classic Nashville Roadshow, a country tribute that features a live Nashville band, an authentic set, vintage costumes, classic Opry-style comedy and real country music.   Read Story »

Hendersonville News

City residents can load up on free mulch, compost

Hendersonville’s annual mulch and compost giveaway is under way. A backhoe operator will be on site to help load the material at the old wastewater treatment plant at 80 Balfour Rd. Hours are 3:30 to 7 p.m. Thursdays and Fridays and 8 a.m. to noon on Saturdays. The giveaway continues through May 13 or until all of the material is gone. The leaves in the compost were collected during the fall of 2015, run through a chipper several times and composted for a year. It should be an excellent addition to vegetable and flower gardens. For questions about this project, please call the Public Works Department at (828) 697-3084.   Read Story »

Hendersonville News

Council hears 4 plans for Grey Hosiery Mill site

The Hendersonville City Council on Thursday night heard a “high level overview” of four proposals for the redevelopment of the Grey Hosiery Mill site.   Read Story »

Hendersonville News

Safelight receives $50,000 for shelter renovations

Safelight has received a donation of $50,000 as a matching gift for their capital campaign for shelter renovations.   Read Story »

Henderson County News

United Way 2016 campaign raises record $2.7 million

United Way of Henderson County raised more than $2.75 million in its 2016 campaign, said Denise Cumbee Long, executive director.   Read Story »

Henderson County News

WHHS junior breaks world record again

Although Josh Hainsel gets little renown in his hometown, he’s world famous in sport stacking.   Read Story »

Henderson County News

United Way 2016 campaign raises record $2.7 million

United Way of Henderson County raised more than $2.75 million in its 2016 campaign, said Denise Cumbee Long, executive director.   Read Story »

Henderson County News

Ask Matt ... how Zillow adds up

Q. I heard that Zillow can determine my home’s value but when I checked it the value came out way over my tax assessment. Is that true across the county? If you are unfamiliar with the company, Zillow is an online free real estate database that uses housing analytics to calculate the value of almost every home in the nation. Want to know what your neighbor’s home is worth? Just type in the address and in seconds you have a boatload of data. It’s easier to navigate than Henderson County’s GIS site but Zillow is not an official record nor is it always accurate.Out of curiosity, I randomly compared County tax value to Zillow’s value for a typical home in seven different neighborhoods. I found that in all but one case the “Zestimate” – the value Zillow puts on each house in its huge database – was higher than the county’s assessed value. The homes I compared in Blacksmith Run, Celedon Hills and Timber Creek had Zestimates within 10% of the County’s listing. Surprisingly, the biggest differentials were in Brookland Manor (32%), Riverwind (32%) and Livingston Farms (16%). The one exception was a house on Lake Summit where Zillow’s figure was 6% below the County’s. Zestimates do better in large developments of similar sized homes.I asked local realtor Noah George for his take on Zillow. He agreed that Zillow’s values go both ways but by their own admission can be 20% off. “When determining the value of a home, nothing can replace boots on the ground,” said George. He said that Zillow estimates can often be very misleading. George remembered a seller who was convinced that his home was worth the posted Zestimate but George was able to sell it for much more. “If he had started with the Zillow figure he would have left $25,000 on the table,” said George.Zillow’s current CEO, Spencer Rascoff, co-authored the book Zillow Talk. In it he talks about how the overall margin of error for Zestimates went from 13.6 percent to less than 7 percent. I found it fascinating that their website uses more than 3.2 terabytes of data each day (a terabyte is a thousand gigabytes). It’s also surprising what they could do with the all the data they have assembled. For example, Rascoff said that homes on streets with the word “lake” are 16% higher in value than the national average but having “sunset” in your street name only gets you a 10% more. Zillow Talk looked at street name suffixes and found that on the average a house on a “court” was worth more than a comparable house on a “street.” Also “lanes” were better than “avenues” but a “place” suffix gets top dollar. Want to change your street name? Here’s one more – a Starbucks coffee shop in the neighborhood increases home values by 31 percent.So is Zillow a good resource? Maybe yes, maybe no, but each month 90 million people use it. What’s your home’s Zestimate? Send us your questions about a local issue, event, sighting or anything that is puzzling you and Lightning’s Matt Matteson will hunt for the answer. Email Matt at:askmattm@gmail.com.   Read Story »

Hendersonville News

Sage Gourmet under new ownership

Sage Gourmet owners Chrissy Filka and Laurie Bakke have sold their business on Main Street.   Read Story »

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