Reston Real Estate: Is Condo Living Right For You?

This is a sponsored post from Eve Thompson of Reston Real Estate. For a more complete picture of home sales in your neighborhood, contact her on Reston Real Estate.

I’ve lived on Lake Anne Plaza for about 16 years now. Rick and I originally purchased our first condo, a 1 bedroom in the high rise, to help out one of our kids who needed a stable place to live while struggling with the transition into fully launched adulthood.

As we painted and prepared the condo for our daughter we were smitten with the property. Later, as we watched the community embrace and support and care about our daughter, our infatuation grew and we knew we’d found a place where we wanted to connect.

It wasn’t long before we sold our single family home and moved into a townhouse in Washington Plaza Cluster — a few years after that we moved into a large condo in the high rise on Lake Anne Plaza.

Throughout our time on Lake Anne we’ve been active in the community. I served for years on the condo board, the landscaping committee, ran the Saturday Craft Market and was active in the Merchant’s Committee. Rick has served on the condo board of directors for the past 10 years.

Whenever I work with clients that are considering condo living I try to explain the unique environment that is created when people live in such close proximity to one another. It puts a little more demand on one’s ability to interact with others in a civil manner.

It’s not that there aren’t all kinds of disagreements and even out and out feelings of hostility — but to give in to those ignoble feelings has much deeper consequences when one lives in community. It’s hard to pass someone in the hall way that you’ve publicly demonized; it divides and tears down the community.

I used to joke that living in the Lake Anne Village Center has taught me a lot about forgiveness — because when you live this close to people your only real choice is to forgive them — otherwise at the end of your first year or so you’d have to lock yourself in your condo.

I think often of hearing Bob Simon saying he wished everyone knew “how nice it was to live in close contact with your fellow humans.” I don’t think Bob was being saccharine when he said that — he was a realist about people’s short-comings, but he understood the great richness that living in community brings into one’s own life; certainly for me a great gift.

Current Market Conditions in Reston

• 203 Active Listings
• 139 Pending Listings
• 144 Sold in the past 30 days

Average Days on Market = 31