A pair of new apartment buildings have opened in Crystal City, with plans for a boxing gym and cafe on the ground floor.
Hazel and Azure at National Landing, located at 3030 and 3130 S. Potomac Avenue, offer a total of 491 apartments ranging from studios to three-bedroom homes.
A recent change to Virginia state code could delay proposed redevelopment of Crystal City’s Melwood parcel by more than a year.
That’s how much time county staff say they will need to evaluate the site’s 102-year-old Nelly Custis School building for any potential historic relevance.
This regularly scheduled column is written by Eli Tucker, Arlington-based Realtor and Arlington resident. If you would like to work with Eli and his team in Northern Virginia and the greater D.C. Metro area, you can reach him directly at [email protected].
Question: How has the Arlington single-family home market performed in the first half of 2026?
Answer: Arlington’s single-family detached (SFD) market got busier and more competitive in the first half of 2026, yet prices increased at their slowest pace since 2023.
More Competition, Modest Appreciation (Resale Market)
Note: this data is for resales of single-family detached (SFD) homes; I have a separate analysis of the new construction market further down.
Dig Deeper: Performance Varied by Size, Price Point
The appreciation gap between the average price (3.5%) and median price (1.9%) matters. The average is more sensitive to expensive sales. In 2026, 15.7% of closed resales sold for $2M or more, up from 12.7% in 2025. At the other end of the market, only 21.7% sold below $1M, down from 24.4%. That shift toward higher-priced homes helped lift the average faster than the median.
Average and median prices are useful, but neither tells us whether gains were shared evenly across the market. To test that, I divided the closed resale market into four sold-price quartiles for each year. Each quartile represents one-fourth of that year’s sales, from the least expensive 25% to the most expensive 25%. (more…)
Developers’ emphasis on building apartments instead of condos in Arlington is proving a challenge for efforts to expand local homeownership opportunities.
County Board member Maureen Coffey lamented the lack of new condominium stock, particularly in more affordable price ranges, during a discussion of the situation at the Jan. 16 Housing Commission meeting.
Locker Room Encounters Recounted — From Fox 5’s Shomari Stone: “Sex offender who identifies as a woman, allegedly caught exposing themselves in a women’s locker room… Spoke to women who say they saw suspect.” [Twitter]
Victims of Bridge Plunge IDed — “The tragic crash last week, where a truck plunged into the icy Potomac River, claimed the lives of twin brothers Jerel and Jerod Wert, according to their sister… the brothers, who are from Chesapeake Beach, Maryland, were on their way to a job in Washington, D.C. at the time of the accident. Jerel worked as a carpenter, and Jerod was an HVAC mechanic.” [Fox 5]
Arlington Man Arrested in Florida — “A Virginia man is facing multiple charges after allegedly assaulting a bar employee and making racially charged remarks at Norman’s Tavern in Miami Beach… When the manager intervened, Nixon allegedly knocked over a glass and made offensive comments, including, ‘Hola, English motherf*****, I live in America, you speak English.'” [WSVN]
A First for Prosecutor’s Office — “The Office of the Commonwealth’s Attorney for Arlington County and the City of Falls Church’s Conviction Integrity Unit secured its first exoneration based on actual innocence. In a 2023 robbery of a Safeway, the perpetrator gave a false name and stolen identification to the police, resulting in an innocent woman being convicted.” [Arlington County]
GOP Calls for Officials to Be Prosecuted — From the Arlington GOP, in response to news that the U.S. Justice Department intends to investigate localities that get in the way of immigration enforcement: “Hey! Hey! Over here! @TakisKarantonis and @parisa4justice are front-line resisters. It’s only a short drive across the Potomac to hold them accountable.” [Twitter]
Water Main Break Near Green Valley — “For several hours, customers in Arlington were without water as emergency crews worked to repair a main break. The Arlington Department of Environmental Services told DC News Now that an 8-inch water main break was reported around 8 p.m. on Tuesday at 2459 S Glebe Road at 24th Street.” [DC News Now, Twitter]
F.C. Hardware Store Closing — “At the end of March, the oldest business in Falls Church will close its doors. Brown’s Hardware, a landmark in the City since 1883, will shutter with the April 1 sale of the property on the northwest corner of Broad and Washington Streets. The buyer and plans for the location at 100 W Broad Street have not yet been made public.” [Falls Church Pulse, Falls Church Independent]
It’s Thursday — It will be mostly sunny with a high around 32 degrees and calm winds shifting to the south at 5 mph. Thursday night will be mostly clear with a low of about 17 degrees, as calm winds turn to the northwest at 5 mph after midnight. [NWS]
Join DC Road Runners and Potomac Valley Track Club for our annual Family Night at the Track and Meet of Miles. The event is open to runners of all ages and paces as well as nonmembers.
This event hosts 400 meter and 800 meter races for kids ages 1-8, as well as multiple 1-mile heats for participants of all ages. There is also a 3K race that is open to participants of all ages.
Good Wednesday evening, Arlington. Let’s take a look back at today’s stories and a look forward to tomorrow’s event calendar.
The following articles were published earlier today — Jan 22, 2025.
Here is what’s going on Thursday in Arlington, from our event calendar.
It will be mostly sunny with a high around 32 degrees and calm winds shifting to the south at 5 mph. Thursday night will be mostly clear with a low of about 17 degrees, as calm winds turn to the northwest at 5 mph after midnight. See more from Weather.gov.
“In the end, it’s not the years in your life that count. It’s the life in your years.”
– Abraham Lincoln
The MonumentCam screenshot above is used with permission of the Trust for the National Mall and courtesy of EarthCam.
Thanks for reading! Feel free to discuss the day’s happenings in the comments.
Arlington Public Schools is addressing “concerns and recent media reports about the presence of a registered sex offender at the Arlington Aquatic Center pools.”
In a message sent to APS families and pool users Wednesday afternoon, Superintendent Dr. Francisco Durán said the school system is taking action “to prevent incidents like this from occurring again.”
By OLIVIA DIAZ Associated Press/Report for America
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — Virginia’s Democratic-led Senate on Tuesday passed constitutional amendments on abortion and voting rights that were quickly lambasted by Republicans who could use the issues as the party tries to regain ground in November’s statewide elections.
A property owner in Crystal City is seeking the county’s blessing to add an outdoor beer garden to a vacant building.
Scapegoat Beer Garden, in the works at 556 22nd Street S. on Restaurant Row, hopes to gain approval from the Arlington County Board to start using two of three outdoor patios constructed — without permits — during the pandemic.
Changes to Arlington voting equipment could increase the number of candidates voters are able to rank.
Arlington voters are currently able to rank only three candidates when participating in ranked-choice voting. However, planned upgrades to voting systems would raise that number to at least five.
