Just when we were getting used to the fact that people were out there buying real estate, the holiday season is now upon us and that usually means slow sales from here to February. The reason I inserted the word "MOSTLY" into the heading of this post is because I noticed throughout the month of October, Keller Williams kept adding listings from upstate. They have now opened up our MLS for other counties and this is going to skew my numbers somewhat. By no means will all of the Kent and Newcastle listings get into our MLS, just some of them where the Broker is looking for additional exposure. I can't quite figure out why, I don't sell anything up there. Well, a case in point is that Single Family Home (SFH) inventory jumped up this month by 1.7% over September, a full 9% above end of 2008 inventory. I think this is due primarily to the addition of these out of Sussex listings. There were 3,242 active listings at the end of October, a 23.6 months supply based on the average closing rate of 138 SFHs per month YTD. The average selling price however went up to the highest level this year, $382K per home bringing the YTD average price up to $348K. This is due to the fact that more higher priced properties are starting to move, not that the home values are appreciating unfortunately. Properties "under contract" came down by the end of October to 346, the lowest level in three months. Some good news is that 178 SFHs closed in October, also the highest number of closings in any month this year and a full 14% ahead of October, 2008. We're now at 94% of 2008 closings YTD. The amount Sellers got for their properties as a % of listing price dropped to 91.1%, below the YTD average of 92.2%. This is particularly troubling as one would think now that Sellers are listing at "closer to realistic" pricing they would start to get a higher percentage of their asking price. This is not the case yet, and until inventory starts to drop you will not see prices firming. Smart real estate investors now should start moving their focus off of price and on to interest rates. With the Fed ending their mortgage backed securities purchasing program, rates are slated to increase by as much as a full percentage point or more.
Now for you Condo/Townhouse (c/th) enthusiasts. There's good news, closings were almost 35% ahead of October 2008 bringing us to 92% of last year YTD. Inventory came up 2.4% to a YTD increase of 5.4% from end of year 2008 inventory. The average selling price came in about the same as September, $327K which is well below the YTD average of $343K. C/TH sellers got 92.5% of their asking price in October, more than the 91.5% YTD average. THERE ARE SOME GREAT DEALS OUT THERE ON CONDOS. HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!