Fayetteville, North Carolina, Minot, North Dakota, and Clarksville, Tennessee have solid and rising home prices. Atypical for the United States right now.
You may know these cities better by the military bases in these cities; Fort Bragg, Minot Air Force Base, and Fort Campbell.
The constant churn of soldier moving around bases has protected these cities from the downturns that most of the country has experienced. What you will not have is high housing prices. Elgin Air Force Base in Florida went through this a few years ago when local housing priced the military right out of the market.
While overall national home prices and sales are down, there are pockets in the U.S. doing well. Among them are military towns dominated by big bases, helped by steady wartime employment and by more moderate increases in values and less reckless lending than many boom areas saw during the bubble.
Some towns have even seen average home prices rise, bolstered by increased recruitment and steady defense-related employment during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Even where prices are down, the bases still help provide plenty of people looking to buy. In the Florida Panhandle, where a saturated housing market saw sluggish sales last year, soldiers at Eglin Air Force Base said the downturn has made it easier for them to purchase homes in an area where demand is bolstered by Gulf Coast beaches. via The Associated Press
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Seeing similar events in Huntsville Alabama home of Redstone Arsenal. Not as many active service members but the Arsenal has about 11,000 and growing US Army and NASA employees and the Base Realignment and Closure BRAC act of 2005 has begun another planned influx of ~4000 jobs from now through 2011.
Kind Regards,
Tim
If only there was a complete correlation: I have a friend stationed in Virginia Beach who's renting out his condo because he would've taken a huge loss had he sold it.