Georgia Real Estate and Demographics Information

Once the cultural and economic capital of the Antebellum South, reliant on plantation agriculture and epitomized by the white landed aristocracy portrayed by Margaret Mitchell in her classic novel, Gone With the Wind, Georgia today represents the "New South." With a population of more than 450,000 African slaves on the eve of the Civil War, Georgia is now home to the black middle class. As of 2000, fully 25% of Atlanta's suburban population was black, the highest percentage in the nation.

The largest state east of the Mississippi, with a topography that varies from mountainous in the north to rolling hills in the center to coastal plain in the south, Georgia nonetheless is dominated by its capital, Atlanta. More than half of the state's 8.8 million residents live in the Atlanta metro area, which grew by 50 percent from 1990 to 2002. Much of this growth occurred as a result of sprawling residential development in the suburbs. Despite the strong job market and growing demand, the median home value of $218,500 makes Atlanta quite affordable compared to other major cities like New York, Boston, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Seattle.

Georgia Economy and Industry

A regional transportation hub, "Hotlanta" is also headquarters for numerous large corporations including Delta (the world's #2 airline), Home Depot, United Parcel Service, Bell South, and of course, Coca-Cola, the most widely recognized commercial product on the planet. Currently, 31 Fortune 500 companies are headquartered in Georgia, ranking it third in the U.S. behind only New York and New Jersey.

Though now owned by the New York conglomerate Time Warner, the revolutionary Cable News Network (CNN), founded by Ted Turner in 1980, is also based in Atlanta. CNN is credited with reinventing television news as the first to offer 24-hour coverage of world events from its Atlanta studios, and through its network of cable channels, radio networks, and websites now claims an audience of 1.5 billion in more than 200 countries.

Along with making a major contribution to the modern global economy, Georgia continues to be an agricultural leader in the U.S as well. The so-called Peach State actually ranks 3rd in peach production behind California and South Carolina, but its peanut and pecan crops lead the nation. Georgia's land area is two-thirds forested, mostly by pine trees, and the state ranks third in the country in production of lumber.

Nicknamed "Empire State of the South", Georgia led the South in production of textiles during the nineteenth century, with 50 cotton mills in operation by the mid-1850s. Small-scale industrialization made textile production more efficient, but ultimately created a bust in the market when prices fell due to oversupply. However, the infrastructure established by the old textile industry allowed Georgia to profit by producing "tufted" carpets, which became increasingly popular with American consumers during the 1950s. Today the $11 billion carpet industry remains heavily concentrated in Georgia, with three out of four of the largest U.S carpet manufacturers based in the northern Georgia city of Dalton, whose name has virtually become synonymous with carpet.