[TheRoBoat]

And I’m glad Gary chimed in, I want his opinion on something a little later.

Crime - it’s not going away, but it can be “moved” as someone said. And they will move it. If anything it makes properties in Laconia a better bargain. I am a little bewildered when I read some of the posts here about crime and drugs. Laconia is a city of 15K plus, starving for money. If it becomes a city of 15K with a bustling economy and 0% unemployment, you are still going to have crime and drugs.

The passions around the individual issues are very apparent, and effect people’s lives on a day to day basis. I want to use that phrase we all hate - let's step back and look at this from 30,000 feet.

"Laconia is a dead end", the "Weirs will never change”. Put that aside for a moment. Think blank slate, because that is really what you have - the entire Weirs and Lakeport area are ripe for redevelopment. It's also what potential investors see.

This isn’t a new idea, in fact it’s been (rightfully) laughed off many times. Especially by people who live there: Lakeport as a bustling artists community centered around food and entertainment. A short drive or train ride away is the happening bar and fun scene of Weirs. A little further up the line is the high end enclave of Meredith, and a little further down the line the yet to be developed even higher end Center harbor. It’s a (close to) year round vacation option for New England.

I may have chuckled before, too.

This is where Gary comes in. While we disagree politically, we do both come from the Bay Area. I see a lot of similarities between the two regions - and I wonder if he does as well. We have also seen that what you once thought was “a lot of money” for a house go to levels you can’t really comprehend, and how fast investments of “stupid amounts of money” can alter a landscape.

I’ll play devil’s advocate to the naysayers.

Laconia is a one hour drive from a rapidly growing metro area with a busy airport, and it is moving north towards you. In 20 years, “Massachusetts” will be as far north as Concord. That’s not the location of a quiet city on the lake. You’re practically a suburb. And it’s arguably some of the best real estate in new England.

In the last 3 years, approximately three hundred and thirty houses in the region sold with a price of over $1M, and seventy five of those have been in the last 6 months. About one hundred of all the sales had a value of over $2M. And how many of those homes are second homes? Laconia has an airport, and they can expand. Two years ago there were just shy of 1,500 turbine flights a year. Thats a lot of money flying in on a daily basis

While maybe not at the same scale, those are some California-esque numbers, and behavior. Can you imagine what they will be after a crash and recovery?

What is my point? From the posts I frequently read - I’m not sure people fully understand what a gold mine you are sitting on. And your world is not coming to mine. Mine is coming to your’s. The value of scarce resources, like SF and the lake, are rising exponentially, in previously incomprehensible ways. What is happening here, is what will be happening there in the not too distant future.

Tilton brought up an interesting point about the drive in. I’ll play devil’s advocate here too. Let’s say it will cost $3M to buy, and have all the archaeology questions answered. So you have to put in $3M before you know if it has any value. A $3M shot in the dark for fun with no guarantee of return.

Those folks exist, all over out the place out here. They will show up there soon.

Happy Thanksgiving. Can't wait to spend one up there.