Author: ARLnow.com Sponsor

Neighborhood Spotlight: 3 Great Options for Takeout Food

By ARLnow.com Sponsor

This content was written and sponsored by The Keri Shull Team, Arlington’s top producing residential real estate team.

Since the stay-at-home order took effect in Virginia at the end of last month, a lot of people living in Arlington and other parts of NoVA have been looking for ways to feel normal again.

One of the best ways that we’ve found is to order food from some of the local favorites around the city. This gives you a chance to support local businesses during these trying times, get a taste of some of your favorite fare from Arlington’s best — and enjoy a nice meal without having to worry about groceries and cooking.

Today, we are going to highlight 3 Arlington favorites that you can get as take-out, so you can enjoy our local flavors from the comfort and convenience of your home.

First is Don Tito, one of our favorite places to get tacos and margaritas in Arlington. Usually, this popular taqueria offers some of the most fun you can have while grabbing a bite, with weekly events like Taco Tuesday and watch parties for sporting events. Of course, patrons won’t be able to attend these events — or dine in at the eatery — until social distancing orders are lifted… but you can still enjoy some of the best tacos and drinks in town!

Although you won’t be able to eat your food on the beautiful rooftop terrace, you can still enjoy some of Arlington’s most scrumptious cantina bites from the comfort of your own home. Best of all? Don Tito’s has created to-go versions of their locally famous margaritas, so you can bring the party right to your doorstep. You can order online for delivery or pick-up at dontitova.com.

Next, we have True Food Kitchen, located in the Ballston Quarter. Like many other stores and restaurants in the Quarter, True Food is doing everything possible to respect social distancing and other safety measures, while still providing nutritious and tasty meals to their patrons.

The Arlington location of True Food Kitchen is remaining open for take out and delivery services — including a special no-contact pick-up option to help protect staff and guests as best as possible. In addition to True Food’s delicious, health-conscious meals, you can order canned beer or bottles of wine with your pick-up or delivery order, so you can round out the True Food Kitchen experience with a refreshing drink. You can click here to place an order for delivery or no-contact pickup!

Finally, we want to talk about Tupelo Honey, home to some of Arlington’s most popular southern comfort food and one of the hottest brunches in the area. Although the dining room is closed to patrons, you can still get a taste of Dixie from the comfort of your own couch with Tupelo Honey’s delivery and pick-up options.

Like Don Tito and True Food Kitchen, Tupelo Honey is open for delivery and pick-up orders — and this includes their brunch options, as well as their lunch and dinner fare! Recreate your favorite weekend tradition with flaky biscuits, griddled potato pancakes and southern-style shrimp & grits!

On top of this, Tupelo Honey is also gearing up to offer BOGO take & bake meals, so you can pick up a meal for dinner and take a second one home to store — so you can heat it up and have southern comfort whenever you want!

Unfortunately, our needs can’t always take a backseat during times like these — that’s why essential businesses are staying open to help people who need it right now. This is true for restaurants like the ones listed above; and it’s also true for real estate teams like the Keri Shull Team. We know that many people can’t wait weeks or months to buy or sell a home, and we are dedicated to protecting those people’s physical and financial health.

So if you have any real estate needs that you have to take care of during these times, please contact the Keri Shull Team or schedule a time for a virtual meeting today.

Your Beermonger: New Normals

By ARLnow.com Sponsor

This sponsored column is written by Nick Anderson, beermonger at Arrowine (4508 Lee Highway). Sign up for Nick’s email newsletter and receive exclusive discounts and offers. Order from Arrowine’s expanding online store for curbside pickup.

We’re starting off this week with recommended reading: Mike Snider at USA Today picked up on that Brewer’s Association survey I mentioned in my last column and ran with it, talking to several breweries about their experience during the pandemic, and how long they think they can sustain themselves.

Like in the survey, the responses are not encouraging but they’re not hopeless either. You can check out the piece here.

Prominently quoted in Snider’s article is Greg Engert of Neighborhood Restaurant Group. Besides local beer scene landmarks like Church Key and the two Rustico locations, NRG also has their Bluejacket Brewery in D.C. Bluejacket’s beers had, over the past year, gone from mostly D.C. with some appearances at Virginia bars and restaurants to becoming available at retailers with draft stations like Arrowine.

Now, Bluejacket is one of a sudden multitude of breweries whose beers will show up right at your door through NRG’s Neighborhood Provisions ordering service (Note: my wife and I placed a Neighborhood Provisions order within the past week; it’s outstanding).

With restaurants being decimated, breweries that were previously focused on “on-premise” sales have shifted, making beers available to consumers that we never would’ve expected to be retailed — and with home delivery, at that. Aslin, Bluejacket, Ocelot, Wheatland Spring and more NoVA breweries are now dropping beers at your doorstep — check with each for minimums, etc.

Outside of the immediate area, Richmond heavy hitters The Veil and Triple Crossing are now offering delivery of their beers to homes in NoVA, making many beer geeks daydreams come true.

It’s odd to encourage people to buy their beer directly from the brewery rather than from Arrowine, but the vast majority of these breweries weren’t distributing to retail anyway and weren’t planning to: the exceptions being the occasional Bluejacket keg (as of this writing, I have two on our draft station) and Aslin can release (again, two new ones just hit our Online Store.)

Also, this whole thing is going to come to an end someday and while I know we’ll lose some — maybe a lot — of our great local breweries, I want as many as possible to survive. Not to mention that right now, when we can’t go out and get together like we want to, it’s nice to have something exciting and enjoyable available. Anyway, we’re not hurting for selection at Arrowine.

So, going forward what I think I’d like to do is, as often as possible, use this column to feature different breweries to shine a light on them, and what they’re going through during this… let’s say unique?… period in time. Drop into the comments if you’ve taken advantage of any of these direct delivery options, whose beers you’ve ordered, and how the experience as been.

Take care of each other. See you next time.

Open Houses in Arlington This Weekend

By ARLnow.com Sponsor

Looking for a home? There are plenty of houses and condos open for viewing this weekend.

Check out the Arlington Realty website for a full list of homes for sale and open houses in Arlington. Here are a few highlights:

3156 N. Pollard Street
8 BD/6 BA, 2 half bath single-family home
Agent: Weichert Realtors
Listed: $2,700,000
Open: Virtual Tour

 

2366 N. Oakland Street
4 BD/4 BA, 1 half bath single-family home
Agent: Compass
Listed: $1,425,000
Open: Virtual Tour

 

1029 N. Kensington Street
4 BD/4 BA, 1 half bath condo
Agent: Re/Max Gateway Llc
Listed: $1,100,000
Open: Virtual Tour

 

6930 27th Road N.
4 BD/3 BA, 1 half bath single-family home
Agent: Redfin Corporation
Listed: $944,999
Open: Virtual Tour

 

2660 S. Kenmore Court
3 BD/3 BA, 1 half bath villa/townhouse
Agent: Ttr Sotheby’s International Realty
Listed: $819,900
Open: Virtual Tour

 

5920 5th Road S.
2 BD/1 BA, 1 half bath single-family home
Agent: Weichert Realtors
Listed: $718,590
Open: Virtual Tour

 

2035 N. Glebe Road
2 BD/3 BA, 1 half bath villa/townhouse
Agent: Compass
Listed: $650,000
Open: Virtual Tour

Just Listed in Arlington

By ARLnow.com Sponsor

Just Listed highlights Arlington properties that just came on the market within the past week. This feature is written and sponsored by Andors Real Estate Group.

It takes a while for trends to become apparent in many things, and real estate is no exception. Now that we have been experiencing the impacts of COVID-19 for over a month, I’m able to start drawing some conclusions.

I’m closely watching a realtor favorite, sale price to list price ratio (SP%/LP%). For sales closed in Arlington over the last 30 days, that ratio is 101.59% meaning, on average, sellers pocketed nearly $12,000 more than they were asking (average sales price $748,421).

If we drop to 15 days of properties sold, that average goes up to 102.24% and will encompass more, but not all properties that went under contract post-COVID-19 restrictions/impact. Conclusion — by and large sellers are still getting what they want in the housing market and buyers are still having to pay up!

Many Arlington homes are still getting multiple offers, but we are seeing fewer offers in these scenarios. Homes that might have attracted 8-12 offers last spring, or even in early January or February, are mostly only getting 2-3 offers right now, and it’s still happening in the first few days of public marketing.

Of course, this does not represent all properties. Some homes don’t receive multiple offers or sell in the first week. Some take multiple price reductions in order to find the market — they were on the market, but not really in the market. This is leading to some head scratching from sellers and maybe realtors alike. Your absolute best bet, sellers, is to hire an experienced Arlington expert and follow guidance on proper pricing and presentation. These are always important considerations and even more so now as the dynamics of our market begin to shift substantially.

There are currently 239 homes for sale in Arlington (a bit over 1.25 months’ supply at current demand). 127 are detached homes, 26 are townhouses/semi-detached, and 86 are condos. Average days on market (DOM) is 55 and median DOM is 31. These stayed almost constant from last week.

Sellers listed some 60 properties for sale this week, up from 44 last week! Buyers ratified 45 contracts, 25 of which were homes that had been on the market one week or less. Average DOM of the ratified properties this week is 13, median is 11, furthering my point about being left on the market instead of in it.

The median list price of available properties is $­­­1,022,500, while the average is $1,154,701.

Last year for the same week, sellers listed 84 homes and buyers ratified 64 contracts. Though the volume is down right now, the absorption rate of new properties is remarkably similar. The supply/demand characteristics are very similar — sellers, make no mistake, this is still very much a seller’s market!

Click here to search currently available Arlington real estate. Call the Andors Real Estate Group today at (703) 203-1117 to talk more about buying or selling Arlington real estate. Below are eight homes that are new this week that I think you might like to check out.

The Spirit of Travel Cannot be Broken

By ARLnow.com Sponsor
1/7

This article was written by Emily Cassell, Director of The Arlington Convention and Visitors Service

No one could have predicted the level to which this pandemic has altered our lives.

In a matter of weeks, millions of people have lost their jobs. Most Americans are staying at home to protect each other, while everyday heroes are keeping the country running. Gone for now are the days of light-hearted socializing at restaurants or simply meeting a friend for a cup of coffee.

And Oxford Economics reports that the travel industry’s losses will far exceed those of any other sector — more than nine times the impact of 9/11. According to the U.S. Travel Association’s April 16 report, Virginia experienced an 84 percent decline in travel spending the previous week, down $451 million from the same week last year.

Here in Arlington it is no different. The County’s tourism industry — which in 2018 provided $3.4 billion in economic impact to our community and supported the livelihoods of nearly 27,000 hard-working people at Arlington hotels, restaurants, stores and other businesses — suffered catastrophic losses almost overnight.

Our hotels are virtually empty during what’s usually a peak travel season. Many have furloughed treasured long-time associates, and several have made the extremely difficult decision to temporarily suspend operations.

Of course, this situation is an unavoidable consequence of the pandemic. Public health experts agree that now is not the time for folks to be traveling or gathering for conferences.

And although we can’t encourage visitors to come right now, we at the Arlington Convention and Visitors Service are doing everything possible to support Arlington’s hotels and local businesses through personal engagement, news and data, and to keep a steady stream of inspiration flowing through our social channels.

As a division within Arlington Economic Development (AED), we’re sharing AED COVID-19 business resources and information on the new GRANT Program that’s designed to provide immediate financial assistance to Arlington’s small businesses. We’re also working behind the scenes on plans for Arlington tourism’s re-emergence from this crisis.

As we approach National Travel and Tourism Week, May 3-9, it is important to recognize the value travel holds for our economy, businesses and personal wellbeing. In the best of times, visitors staying in Arlington’s hotels are going to restaurants — often for multiple meals a day.

They’re buying things in our independent stores and shopping malls. They’re attending theatrical performances, concerts and neighborhood festivals. They’re experiencing our iconic sights and traveling via Metro, taxis, Lyft and Uber. They’re contributing greatly to local employment and to the success of our small businesses. Without those visitors, we’re not the community we know we can be.

If we Arlingtonians have learned anything from past crises and this current one, it’s that the hospitality industry is both united and resilient. We will return, as will Arlington’s small businesses. It’s up to all of us to support our hospitality colleagues, and to make the industry’s comeback a triumphant one.

In the meantime, I wish you and your loved ones all the best for good health and safety, and I look forward to our making our way through this challenging time together.

Boring Title: What Makes a Video Go Viral?

By ARLnow.com Sponsor

Title insurance is boring, but Allied Title & Escrow is here to decode the jargon and make it (somewhat) more interesting. This biweekly feature will explore the mundane (but very necessary!) world of title insurance while sharing interesting stories of two friends’ entrepreneurial careers.

For this week’s edition of Boring Title, we wanted to open up a discussion with those reading ARLnow.

The past month, we’ve had Mike from our marketing team shoot and post one video per day. While some of these videos have been educational, others have been funny videos with the sole purpose behind them is to provide laughs to clients during these stressful times.

The videos have been well received by our clients and those who know Allied Title & Escrow, but one video in particular went semi-viral (See below).

@alliedmikeDon’t you wish all buyers were this easy!? ##fyp ##foryou ##forypupage ##realestate @drewcarp89♬ Intentions – Justin Bieber

With around 500,000 views and 70,000 likes on TikTok, it made us all wonder… what gives a video the ability to go viral? This specific video was not the funniest, or the most educational, and we didn’t have any expectations for it to go “viral.”

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Saluting Arlington Free Clinic’s Volunteers During National Volunteer Week

By ARLnow.com Sponsor
1/5

In celebration of National Volunteer Week, Arlington Free Clinic (AFC) would like to say THANK YOU to our amazing volunteers!

Our 450+ volunteers are the foundation that allows AFC to provide free, high-quality care to our low-income, uninsured neighbors in normal times, and they have enabled us to continue caring for those most vulnerable to being overlooked and forgotten during the COVID-19 crisis. When it would be easy to say, ”I need to look out for me,” they have instead said “What can I do to help?”

From the moment we announced our new protocols last month, volunteers have stepped up — whether it’s a provider offering to learn our new telehealth system, an interpreter signing up to be “on-call” for virtual visits, pharmacists coming in to make sure our patients’ prescriptions get filled, or nurses making check-in calls to ensure patients and their families all are well, informed and have the resources they need.

Thank you for your incredible work and dedication to our mission.

Learn more about Arlington Free Clinic’s continued work during the COVID-19 crisis here.

If you’d like to support us financially, please consider a gift in honor of our volunteers for Volunteer Week.

High Quality Medical Interpreting Is Crucial During Covid-19 Pandemic

By ARLnow.com Sponsor
1/4

Imagine the fright in coming down with symptoms of coronavirus: fever, cough, tiredness and trouble breathing. Then imagine trying to navigate the health care system with limited English skills, especially when loved ones are barred from medical settings to limit the virus spread.

We’re hearing about the risks facing front line workers including doctors, nurses, emergency personnel and service workers, yet there are also disturbing reports that medical interpreters are not being afforded personal protective equipment and protocols, and of patients experiencing sub-standard, potentially life-threatening barriers to services.

“High quality medical interpretation allows healthcare service providers to effectively communicate and comply with language access laws,” says Silvia Villacampa, Managing Director of Liberty Language Services in Vienna, Virginia.

“Because in-person interpreters risk exposure like all health care workers, video remote and over-the-phone interpreting are excellent ways to reduce risk while providing much needed support to service providers serving limited English-speaking patients in our community,” Villacampa adds.

25 million people in the U.S. speak no or limited English, and the COVID-19 epidemic has intensified longstanding language access issues in health care. Video remote technology, which can be used with any phone, tablet or computer with a webcam, offers the safest solution.

“It’s HIPAA compliant, and our trained and qualified interpreters work in hundreds of languages, as well as American Sign Language,” Villacampa notes.

With years of experience providing on-site medical and legal interpretation services throughout the mid-Atlantic region, Liberty Language Services applies the same careful vetting, training, testing and understanding clients’ needs to Video Remote and Over the Phone Interpreting.

Visit the Liberty Language Services website for more information.

Biz Talk: Arlington Tracks COVID-19 Impacts on County Businesses

By ARLnow.com Sponsor

This article was written by Telly Tucker, Director of Arlington Economic Development.

We’re now in the sixth week of various shutdowns, teleworking, staff reductions and other challenges in Arlington as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, and Arlington Economic Development (AED) has been closely monitoring the effects on all our businesses.

In the latter half of March, just as the gravity of the situation was beginning to emerge, we conducted our first COVID-19 business survey. We had more than 600 businesses take the survey, which concluded on March 30 — coincidentally, the day before the April 1 Stay at Home Executive Order took effect in Virginia.

But even before that order was in place, it came as no surprise for us to learn that Arlington businesses were impacted — some significantly. Overall, the majority of our business respondents reported declining sales, hiring freezes, supply chain disruptions and delayed or canceled investments, with a considerable number having laid off workers as a result of the pandemic.

More than 70% of all Arlington businesses, and more than 90% of small businesses (those with fewer than 50 employees), said COVID-19 was “extremely disruptive” or “very disruptive” to their business operations. Additional details on survey results can be found on our website.

Across the varied results, the most pressing need respondents identified was financial assistance, everything from grant assistance to SBA economic injury assistance, tax payment assistance to landlord assistance. Remember — these results were even prior to the Stay at Home order. AED has been working diligently to connect companies to resources while working to develop some of our own.

Last week we announced the creation of the Arlington Small Business Emergency GRANT (Giving Resiliency Assets Near Term) Program, which will provide up to $10K in funds for businesses who need to keep up with payroll, rent and other expenses during the pandemic. We plan to have the application process open in early May; to receive future communications as details about the GRANT program are finalized, please add yourself to the mailing list on our GRANT page.

Additionally, we set up a COVID-19 Business Support section on our website, which covers everything from lists of restaurants providing carryout/delivery options to special offers from local businesses. We’re also providing the latest breakdowns on CARES Act and SBA actions as well as free webinars and counseling for businesses to help them navigate the various assistance programs and resources out there.

Finally, AED has just launched Phase 2 of the COVID-19 Arlington business survey. Each week brings new challenges and we understand the importance of keeping up-to-date on the impacts being felt by our community.

If you represent a business in Arlington, please take a few moments to complete this new survey in English or Spanish so AED can continue to assist you. The survey will remain active through April 30. Some of the questions may seem repetitive if you took our first survey, but we ask for your participation to help us continue to monitor the situation and aid us in developing appropriate resources and communications.

Just Reduced Properties in Arlington

By ARLnow.com Sponsor

Each week, “Just Reduced” spotlights properties in Arlington County whose price have been cut over the previous week. The market summary is crafted by Arlington Realty, Inc. Maximize your real estate investment with the team by visiting www.arlingtonrealtyinc.com or calling 703-836-6000 today!

Please note: While Arlington Realty, Inc. provides this information for the community, it may not be the listing company of these homes.

A happy Earth Day to our readers here. It’s certainly a bit of a different Earth Day here in 2020.

No, we’re not going to encourage you to go celebrate our green and blue planet in masses out in public. But there are a couple of things on the real estate front that you can do from your own home to make a difference.

The first thing is examining how you can make your home more energy efficient. Whether it’s upgrading your old HVAC set-up or giving your insulation a refresh, these fixes not only protect Mother Nature, but put dough back in your pocket. And, in many cases, these upgrades can be tax deductible.

Also, as you weather the COVID-19 storm, it’s a good time to think about your property’s curb appeal. If you have the green light to plant a tree where you live, they give off oxygen and a little extra never hurts us humans.

And now on to this week’s Just Reduced facts and stats.

As of April 20, there are 148 detached homes, 30 townhouses and 88 condos for sale throughout Arlington County. In total, 9 homes experienced a price reduction in the past week:

Please note that this is solely a selection of Just Reduced properties available in Arlington County. For a complete list of properties within your target budget and specifications, contact Arlington Realty, Inc.

Ask Eli: Landscaping to Improve At-Home Living

By ARLnow.com Sponsor

This regularly-scheduled sponsored Q&A column is written by Eli Tucker, Arlington-based Realtor and Arlington resident. Please submit your questions to him via email for response in future columns. Enjoy!

Question: We want to make our time at home more enjoyable by improving our outdoor space. What are some of the most common landscape/hardscape improvements you see in Arlington?

Answer: After six weeks in a row of Coronavirus market analysis/updates, I thought it would be a nice change of pace to talk about some ways you can improve your outdoor space to make staying at home more enjoyable. A nicely landscaped yard can also provide a strong return on resale, especially while stay-at-home orders are fresh in buyers’ minds.

To provide the best perspective on popular landscaping projects around Arlington, I asked Robert Groff of Groff Landscape Design, an Arlington-based landscape and hardscape firm, to share some of the most popular projects they do.

Thank you for sharing your insights Robert, take it away…

Thank you Eli and hello ARLnow. If all of this time at home has inspired you to invest in your outdoor space, I hope some of these projects are an inspiration.

April Showers Bring…Wet Basements and Mosquitos

We’ve all been reminded lately to be prepared for possible threats. Now is the time to make sure rainwater is directed away from your home foundation and mosquito breeding grounds (standing water) are minimized.

Create Family Experiences

Patios — Patios are not only for dining and grilling anymore. Patio activities can include yoga, outdoor office, study space, play space or even an outdoor movie theatre! With infinite amounts of material options here are our top recommendations:

  • Least Expensive: Concrete Slab. In our region, concrete cracks but when necessary it absolutely has its place.
  • Most Dynamic & Most Popular: Concrete Pavers. We highly recommend Techo-bloc manufactured materials because of their lifetime warranty, density rating and wide range of colors, textures and styles.
  • Favorite for Contemporary Style: Porcelain Tile for Exterior Use.
  • Natural Stone: Flagstone is still extremely popular especially for our traditionalists!

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