Home prices in Chattanoo-ga grew nearly twice as fast as the nationwide average in the past year, buoyed by both an improving local economy and a shrinking inventory of homes that encouraged buyers to bid up prices.

The National Association of Realtors said Wednesday the median price of homes sold by Realtors in the Chattanooga area rose over the past year by 11.3 percent — or $16,0000 for the typical home — to a median sales price of $157,200. The price gains in Chattanooga outpaced

all other Mid-South cities.Nathan Walldorf, a broker for

Herman Walldorf Real Estate who is the 2015 president of the Greater Chattanooga Associa-tion of Realtors, said the higher median price reflects both the price appreciation of existing homes and the buying prefer-ence for higher-priced homes compared with a year ago.

“We had a lot fewer first-time homebuyers in the market com-pared with the growth in exist-ing homeowners moving up or new people coming into the market, often from cities with higher average home prices,” Walldorf said. “The price ranges being paid are definitely higher

and we’re seeing more demand now for higher-priced proper-ties than we have seen in a long time.”

Chattanooga home prices still averaged nearly 30 percent below the U.S. median at the end of last year even with the faster price appreciation during 2015, however.

Nathan Brown, a team lead-er for the Keller Williams office downtown, said homebuyers who move to Chattanooga from many other markets are often pleasantly surprised by the rel-atively lower prices of homes in the Scenic City. As more such

A Chattanooga panel on Wednesday agreed to sell its interest in the Walnut Com-mons apartments project to a Nebraska real estate business for at least $761,000.

The move by the Chatta-nooga Downtown Redevelop-ment Corp. sets up a potentially thorny meeting later this month

involving another city panel that earlier granted tax breaks to the development.

A taxpayer watchdog group has called for an end to the city’s payment-in-lieu-of-taxes (PILOT) agreement for Walnut Commons, located at Walnut Street and Aquarium Way, and for the property to be put back on the tax rolls.

A s demand for Tennessee Whiskey continues to soar, Jack Daniel Distillery in Lynchburg, Tenn., announced Wednesday it will invest $140 million to build two new barrel houses

and expand its existing bottling facility, which will cre-ate 30 new jobs in Moore County.

“This year marks the 150th anniversary of the Jack Daniel Distillery, and as one of the state’s most respected brands, we thank the company for its long history in our state,” Randy Boyd, commissioner for the state Department of Economic and Community Development said in an announcement.

The state expects to help fund the improvements at the distillery, owned by Brown-Forman Corp., through a FastTrack grant, said ECD spokesman Clint Brewer. Such grants can be used to support companies

GigTank, the startup acceler-ator that gave rise to Feetz and Branch Technology, is expand-ing to become a year-round program, The Company Lab announced Wednesday.

“GigTank 365” will offer a summer cycle as it has in years past, in addition to spring and fall cycles.

“It’s Co.Lab’s job to help sup-port aspiring entrepreneurs all the time,” said Mike Bradshaw, the nonprofit organization’s executive director. And Co.Lab’s research shows that there’s demand for it from startups with high-bandwidth business applications, GigTank’s sweet spot, he said.

Plus, continuity will make GigTank more “efficient and effective,” Bradshaw said. The program relies on many estab-lished businesses and profes-sionals. “It’s better to keep a perpetual engagement with these partners than it is to spin it up for the summer, and then bring it down,” he said.

GigTank 365 will focus on three tracks — healthcare, 3-D printing and SDN (software defined net-working) — along with a general gigabit business track.

One more change: municipal power distributor EPB will pro-vide its new 10 gigabit-per-sec-ond Internet service to Co.Lab’s new location in the Edney Inno-vation Center, where GigTank 365 will take place.

A prototype of GigTank 365 launches this month, the spring cycle. There will be space for about eight startups. Co.Lab already has candidates lined up for several of the spots, but admission is still open, Bradshaw said.

One company that’s partici-pating is Collider, a 3-D-printing

T I M E S F R E E P R E S S .CO M / B U S I N E S STHURSDAY, FEBRUARY 11, 2016

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Dave FlessnerBUSINESS EDITORPhone 423-757-6340Email business@timesfreepress.comDelivery Issues 423-757-6262

Rising home valuesMedian home prices rose more in Chattanooga than any other MidSouth metro area.

* Median price for the fourth quarter, 2015Source: National Association of Realtors

Metro market Median price* Yearly increaseU.S. average $222,700 6.9 percentNashville $207,300 10.7 percentHuntsville $176,500 1.3 percentBirmingham $172,400 1.5 percentAtlanta $169,200 7.3 percentChattanooga $157,200 11.3 percentKnoxville $155,500 3.1 percentMemphis $141,000 4.3 percent

STAFF GRAPHIC BY MATT MCCLANE

GigTank now year-round program

BY MITRA MALEKCORRESPONDENT

See GIGTANK › C2

Focus is on healthcare, 3-D printing

CONTRIBUTED PHOTO

The Jack Daniel’s distillery says it offers a smooth pair-ing of tradition and the new sweet liqueur.

BY TIM OMARZUSTAFF WRITER

The addition will help meet booming demand for bourbon

Jack Daniel’s announces

$140 million expansion

A glass of Jack Daniel’s whis-key is exam-ined after being taken from an aging

barrel.

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

See EXPANSION › C2

VW, Audi, BMW recall vehicles in air bag messTHE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Volkswagen, Audi and BMW are recalling nearly 1.7 million vehicles with Takata air bag inflators that can rup-ture and hurl shrapnel into drivers and passengers.

The moves announced Wednesday bring to just over 5.1 million the number of vehi-cles in the latest round of Taka-ta recalls. U.S. safety regula-tors announced the recalls last month after a South Carolina man was killed by an explod-ing driver air bag inflator.

So far, VW, Audi, BMW, Daimler, Honda, Ford and Mazda have announced recalls in the latest round. Since 2008, about 24 million U.S. vehicles have been recalled due to the inflators, with about 50 mil-lion recalled worldwide.

On Wednesday, VW and Audi said they would recall a total of 850,000 vehicles in the U.S. from model years 2006 to 2014.

The recal l covers cer-tain 2006 to 2010 VW Passat sedans and wagons made in Germany, as well as some U.S.-made Passats from 2012 to 2014. Also included are the 2010 to 2014 Golf and Jetta SportWagen, the 2009 through 2014 CC, and the 2012 through 2014 Eos.

Also included are some Audi A3 cars f rom 2005 through 2015, some 2006 through 2009 A4 Cabrios, certain 2009 to 2012 Q5 SUVs and some 2010 and 2011 Audi A5 Cabrios.

BMW added 840,000 later in the day for the same prob-lem. That recall includes cer-tain 1 Series coupes and con-vertibles from 2008 to 2013,

See RECALL › C2

InsideSee story about Subaru recall, C2

STAFF FILE PHOTO BY DAN HENRY

Walnut Com-mons is seen in downtown

Chattanooga.

City panel agrees to sell Walnut Commons siteBY MIKE PARESTAFF WRITER

See SITE › C2

Chattanooga home prices jump nearly twice as fast as U.S. averageBY DAVE FLESSNERSTAFF WRITER

See HOME PRICES › C2