ANDERSON — High foreclosure numbers and the difficulty of getting a home loan have drawn national attention, but Madison County’s real-estate market is holding up better than others.

“The picture being painted by the national media is all doom and gloom, and that’s just not the reality,” said Jim Bittner, president of the Anderson/Madison County Association of Realtors and broker/co-owner of the Anderson Re/Max Real Estate Group. “There are wonderful values on the market in Central Indiana.”

Bittner said recent statistics show Madison County with a 1.5 percent reduction in property value while others had substantially higher rates.

“Although Madison County has seen decreases, they’re certainly no larger than decreases that have been evident throughout the entire Indiana market,” said Scott Sparks, branch manager of Anderson’s Carpenter Realtors. “Madison County is certainly not singled out. There are many areas of central Indiana that haven’t done as well either, so we really have held our own.”

Both Bittner and Tom Ross, co-owner of Anderson’s Century 21 group, were hesitant to define the current real-estate situation as a buyer’s market, instead saying sellers could fare well in the market as long as they list their homes correctly.

“If it’s leaning one way or another, certainly it’s a buyer’s market,” Ross said. “The seller’s going to take a little bit of a hit today because prices have dropped and value has taken a little bit of a hit.”

Bittner said price, location and condition all affected how well a seller could do in today’s market.

“The secret to success in the market we’re in right now if you’re selling is to price your house right,” he said. “Establish true market value. If you’re even a little bit overpriced, it will just languish.”

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Past housing woes

One reason Madison County doesn’t seem to have been hit as hard by the housing crash as other areas of the country is because the county went through many of its hard times several years ago when General Motors left town.

“What’s different about our market is that back in the day years ago when other areas of the country were experiencing this wonderful appreciation in home prices, we never had quite that much appreciation,” Ross said. “The tumble wasn’t quite as bad for us this time because we were kind of low to begin with. Our market is lower than it should be, but not to the devastating effect that other areas of the country are experiencing.”

Madison County home prices have dropped about 15 percent as opposed to other areas of the country where they have dropped 20-25 percent, said Ross, whose real estate group had more than 30 sales last month.

Although the market isn’t booming, the worst Ross has seen was in 1981-82 when interest rates were close to 15 percent and unemployment was at 17 percent.

“The type of market that we have is different from any that we’ve experienced in recent years because there are lots of foreclosures and short sales,” he said. “We’re still selling homes. It’s not what I would call standard booming business, but it’s not the worst market I’ve ever seen.”