I had an interesting conversation with a potential real estate investor earlier this week -- he asked whether townhouses generally increase in value over time. 

We decided to take a look at the data, which is shown above, and the conclusions are not necessarily clear.

• Values increased very quickly between 2003 and 2006.
• Values increased a bit more slowly between 2006 and 2008.
• Values declined between 2008 and 2012.
• Values have increased since 2012.

So, in the past 15 years, there have been some intense increases, some depressing decreases, and some recent recovery.

The yellow line is the general trendline over time, which shows that overall, values have trended positively over the past 15 years.

So, do townhouse values generally increase over time?  Let's go with 'yes' for now -- but continue to monitor as we hopefully have a more normal next three to five years in our local real estate market.