The dog days of August are upon us.  But we sure had a nice stretch of weather in late July with the temps in the low 80’s and the humidity around 50%.  That was extraordinary.  Expedia ranked us as the 6th Coolest City in the US, but I don’t think they were talking about temperatures.  August is a great time for baseball at the Joe. And of course, school is starting back near mid-August.  Here is your August calendar of events:

1-3: Tax Free Weekend

1: Brent Cobb, Windjammer IOP

2: Reggae Nights, James Island County Park

2: Magnolia Cemetery Tour

4: Kiawah Island Open Water Swim

8: Kiss, N Chas Coliseum

9: 4th Annual Bow Ties and Date Auction, The Alley

11: Charleston Sprint Triathlon

15: Gay Bingo Mad Hatters Ball, N Chas Convention Center

16: Moonlight Mixer, Folly Pier

17: Charleston Summer Wine Festival, Memminger Auditorium

17: 17th Annual Ballpark Festival of Beers, Joe Riley Stadium

17: 21st Annual Half Rubber Tournament, Isle Of Palms

17: Hootie’s Homegrown Roundup: Back 2 School Basics, Burke High School

18: First Day Festival, Liberty Square

19: Toad the Wet Sprocket, Chas Music Hall

19: Dorchester and Berkeley Counties schools open for students

21: Charleston County schools open for students

21: Arshak Sirunyan Quartet, Gibbes Museum

23: Alan Jackson, N Chas Coliseum

24: 6th Annual SC Reggae Jerk Wine Festival, Magnolia Gardens

24: Homeless to Hope Fund, Gaillard

30,31: Lowcountry Jazz Fest

Charleston was voted #1 City in the US for the 7th consecutive time by Travel and Leisure Magazine. And we were only one of two cities in the US to rank in the top 15 in the World. Sante Fe was the other.  So, we’re not a hidden gem anymore.  And the whole state of Ohio wants to move here!  This has been a boom for our real estate market over  those last 7 years.  2017 was the best of all with 2018 just a few hundred transactions behind.  The fall of 2018 was a bit slower than we expected.  That could have had something to do with the government shutdown.  The last two weeks have been the busiest buying weeks we’ve ever had after mid-July.  We think this fall will be much busier than 2018 and that could mean 2019 will be a record year.  So far, through the first half of 2019, sales are down 1.8% compared to the same 2018 period.  But again, we anticipate the fall of 2019 to be much better than the fall of 2018. Median sales price is up 3.7% to an all time high of $280k.