Slow Sales in January/ February

The latest Longmeadow home sales figures for February 2008 are now available and they do not look very good.

[click to enlarge graph]

Comparison of the total sales for January/ February 2008 vs. 2006 and 2007 are shown in the table below:

With a current inventory of ~ 110 Longmeadow homes for sale (MLS + FSBO) , these latest sales figures do not bode very well for sellers. While media pundits prophetize that sales will pick up in late 2008 or early 2009, no one really knows since buyer psychology as well as the health of the national economy will play important roles in a housing turnaround.

While it is still before the emergence of the Spring selling season, emergence of tulips from their winter sleep will likely increase the number of home for sale to at least 130-140.

It looks like median sales prices have retreated recently as shown in the graph below:

[click to enlarge graph]

As commented in an earlier post, this upcoming real estate season should be great time to buy a house given the abundant inventory and softening prices. If you are in the market for a new house check out the available offerings on Longmeadow-FSBO.

Local Housing Data

For those who are interested in a wealth of local real estate data there is an excellent resource that can be found on the William Raveis Real Estate website. For each town in Massachusetts (and Connecticut) some of the housing data that can be viewed include median sales prices, home sales and average market time for the past three years. In addition, comparison of local data to county and state results are also presented. All results are in easy to read graphical formats and all of this data is compiled from MLSPIN.

The most significant trends from 2005 to 2007 for Longmeadow include stable median sales prices ($330,000 -> $320,000 -> $330,000), longer time to sell (56 days -> 84 days -> 91 days) and fewer home sales (199 ->178 -> 186).

This resource is certainly worth evaluating if you want to learn more about the local real estate market.

Pioneer Valley Real Estate

This morning’s Springfield Sunday Republican has a feature story in their Outlook 2008 section on Real Estate in the Pioneer Valley. Here is a link to the full story that basically captures the similar thoughts that have appeared in this blog.

To summarize:

• The real estate situation for many towns in the Pioneer Valley is quite different from Eastern Massachusetts and other parts of the country. One local exception may be portions of the City of Springfield which has been hit pretty hard with foreclosures- some of which may be a result of rental property speculation and others related to the problems in sub-prime mortgages.


• While the number of homes sold in the Pioneer Valley dropped in 2007 (4891) as compared to 2005 (5865) – a 16.6% drop, median home sales prices have been pretty stable over the past couple of years.
  
  [As summarized in a previous "Buzz" blog article, the number of sales in Longmeadow actually increased in 2007 (198) vs. 2006 (189) – a 4.8% increase.]
  
• One reason for the more stable prices in our local real estate market vs. turmoil (large price drops) in the rest of the country may be the lower level of housing speculation for the Springfield area.
  
• Prices are relatively soft, the inventory of unsold homes is relatively high and fixed rate mortgage rates are dropping making for a “buyers market”. For those people with good credit and an interest in purchasing a home for the long term, now may be a great time to find that dream home. It is very difficult to time the purchase of a home at the exact bottom of the real estate slump.
  
  The article is worth taking the time to read.