By Mike Bodeen · 5 October 2020
SALES:
New September listings, compared to 2019, increased 17%. On the surface that sounds promising for buyers who have continued to experience a dearth of available homes on the market. Unfortunately, the extra listings were met with increased demand, so the net result was 73 more listings on the market compared to last month, but a whopping 41% drop from last year for total available listings.
Under contract listings are up 34% compared to one year ago and slightly up from last month. It is estimated that half of sales under $500,000.
The big news continues to be appreciation clobbering our market. The average sales price per square foot (PSF) is now $199, up 17% from one year ago. Likewise the average sales price is also up 17% from last year. Because current deals are now appreciating at a rate of 2% per month, we may shortly find an appreciation market running over 20% annually.
Active Listings: 8,101 vs 13,755 last year – down 41.1% – but up 0.9% from 8,028 last month
Under Contract Listings: 13,203 vs 9,848 last year – up 34% – and up 1.2% from 13,042 last month
Monthly Sales: 9,667 versus 8,022 last year – up 20.5% – and up 4.9% from 9,213 last month
Monthly Avg Sales Price per Sq. Ft: $199 vs $170 last year-up 17.1%-and up 1.9% from $195 last month
Monthly Median Sales Price: $327,000 vs $279,500 last year – up 17.0% – and up 0.6% from $325,000 last month
With the hyper-competitive resale market, some buyers are turning to new builds. The advantage there is lack of competing offers. A word of caution, however. Because of the significant appreciation rates we’re experiencing, some builders are not accepting contracts unless the homes they’re building are near completion. Builders are seeing too much appreciation during their 6-8 month building time period and are wondering why they should just give that away?
FORECLOSURES?
With buyer frustration running way high, some clients ask us about foreclosures. There’s no help there. Foreclosures only numbered 99 in September, which is 76% below last September 2019’s numbers. For context, 2009 saw over 5000 foreclosures per day and at one point there were over 51,000 pending foreclosures (See Chart Below).
Today, most sellers have enough equity to sell their homes without being underwater. What will happen when lenders are able to begin foreclosures post-covid? To be honest, we don’t think that will change the playing field too much.