Much of the country is suffering from the cancellation of the federal home buyer tax credit, with sales falling and prices plummeting. The Grand Strand area, though, are not suffering as bad a fate as the big metropolitan areas. Though sales and prices are also wavering in the said area, the drop is not as drastic as others.

The federal home buyer tax credit, which assured as much as $8,000 credit to first-time home buyers and as much as $6,500 to others, resulted to a surge in home sales. The number of sales dropped when the tax credit was canceled in April, with July seeing the most impact at a 12.4% drop from June and 32.4% from 2009 – this, according to a Commerce Department report is the lowest since 1963. The drop may also be attributed to the drop in employment rate, employment being a top reason for relocation and purchase of new homes.

The Grand Strand area, however, is not affected by the same things as typical real estate areas. The market it attracts includes second-home buyers and investors. So when the tax credit was introduced, it did not really create much of a boost in home sales for the area. This is also the reason there’s not much of a dent in the July sales for Grand Strand.

In the Myrtle Beach area, single family home sales in July this year are down by 7% vis-a-vis July 2009; condos sales, on the other hand, are down by 4%. Exit Grand Strand Real Estate Realtor Jerry Pinkas says this is but a normal thing for them and that they are not worried that further drop will occur because of the tax credit cancellation. The area’s Realtors, after all, have the beach to keep attracting buyers.

The Grand Strand area has never really seen significant price increase in the last years and has only done so in July. That month saw the single-family homes median price at 7% up from 2009 and the condos median price at a 13% increase. With lots of foreseen foreclosures and short sales to happen in the next few months, prices are again expected to drop. But Realtors in the area see this as something good: considering their market, low prices mean more buyers.

Those looking at getting a second home in this economy flock to areas like Grand Strand in this current economy. They are all too eager to take advantage of low home prices in a beach area.

Half of the Grand Strand homes purchased in July were actually paid in cash. This only means investors are still shelling out money for real estate properties. And more and more buyers are finding money to include home purchases in their investments.

The Grand Strand Realtors, though, need not be too confident. Though the outlook for their area is better, prices are expected to drop further and further because of foreclosures.