The description practically comes from a real estate brochure. But this week it was the reason many of the homes in the area flooded with water and mud.

Agent Matt Capritto is representing a house for sale on Nye Road. It was not damaged, and neither was its property value, he said.

"My phone will not stop ringing because there was flooding in a few houses," he said.

Real estate professionals agreed: The disaster will recede from people's minds with the water. The high demand for housing in Ventura County is expected to drive interest even to damaged homes. But agents recommend buyers be diligent about learning the history of a home to avoid purchasing headaches.

La Conchita might be an exception.The deadly mudslide destroyed homes and left a gash in the mountain that will be difficult to ignore. It's uncertain when property values in the seaside village might rebound. Obtaining financing and insurance might be difficult.

Home values in the community plummeted after a mudslide in 1995, but the hot real estate market brought them back. Homes that sold in the small enclave were worth about $160,000 before the 1995 slide and less than $100,000 afterward, provided the buyer could get the financing.

Bob Dougherty, president-elect of the Ventura County Coastal Association of Realtors, said prices started to rebound in 1999 and nearly caught up with the rest of the market. The three sales in the past 12 months were in the range of $560,000.

As long as the land is stable, prices are likely to be, too, said Louis Manzo, an agent in Santa Barbara for Pitts & Bachmann Realtors and president of the Santa Barbara Association of Realtors.

"It could be as simple as a disclosure issue to the next buyer, all the way to having to lower the prices because it is so hard to get insurance," he said.

Property tax assessments can be changed for any property with more than $10,000 worth of damage. Assessor Dan Goodwin said even if the home or land is going to be repaired, it pays to have the bill reduced for now.

Assessments are based on the marketability of land. Goodwin said the office takes in to account the reduced desirability of a home as well as physical damage.

"In La Conchita, we have the event of the slide and the perception of what else might happen, which creates a stigma, which affects the marketability," he said.

Dougherty said he was back showing houses to buyers around the county Tuesday -- at least those he could get to.

"Once we get past the cleanup here, people tend to just move on and go on with their normal lives," he said.

The supply of homes in Ventura County is so tight that prices are not easily affected, Dougherty said.

"Areas that were hardest hit will see some quiet time, but not much," he said.

Lingering concerns can be mold, structural damage if the cleanup was not done properly and inability to get insurance for a house that has had water damage.

The key for homeowners in the future will be disclosure at the time of sale, Manzo said. Buyers need to know what has happened to the house and may have a difficult time convincing an insurance company that the property is a good risk.

"The next buyer may not be able to get insurance, so I don't think it will be as easily forgotten," he said.

La Conchita will face a real struggle for property values to come back, if they ever do. Manzo said it is going to take a lot of engineers to determine which houses are too risky for banks to lend on or insurance companies to take on for buyers.

"If anything, you are talking years before La Conchita will recover," he said.