Market Update
IT'S A BUYERS MARKET
SALES:
The multiple listing service reports only 5 homes going under
contract over the last month. This number is quite a bit lower
than normal, and It was actually quite a surprise to me when I ran the
report, because it seems like there has been quite an increase in
activity. We definitely have seen more people shopping for homes.
The story was the same last month, and the number of sales still has not
climbed. Obviously the shopper are not in a rush to become buyers.
inventory/
time on the market:
Currently we have 217 homes on the market which is up 14 from last
month and the most we have
ever had. This is not a surprise however considering the growth of
the town since 2004, this is only a 20% gain in inventory since then.
The average time on the market is averaging 6 months which is reasonably
close to the average of years past (excluding 2005 of course)
PRICES:
We have not seen any notable changes in prices over the last year,
The Arizona republic reports a 3.7 percent increase in Median home
prices from last year. I don't think that Median reflects an
increase in property values however, It just reflects the fact that we
are selling more homes in the higher price ranges. (I ran the same
stats and found that removing even one sold home could make as much as
1.5% change in the median) I have
performed a couple of valuations for homes recently where I was able to
compare back to valuations I had done on the same home in 2005, so that
has been educational. The results of those valuations have
shown about a 5% increase in value since then.
Expectations:
II have been expecting
sales to pick up as we get into the winter months, but so far
that has not been the case, sales are actually down from the summer.
So with more buyers shopping, and even more choices it is a great time
to be a buyer. But the Holidays are not a busy time, so my
prediction is that the number of sales will stay about the same through
new years. After that we should see a jump in the number of sales.
I don't think the sales will outpace the number of new listing however,
so I think the number homes on the market will continue to increase.
With so many
choices on the market the buyers will continue to gravitate toward the
best deals, leaving many seller sitting on the market for extended
periods. So things are looking up for those motivated sellers,
because there will be more buyers, otherwise sellers had better consider
price reductions. For buyers the time is right. Wickenburg
does not have a history of falling property values, but this year may
actually see some small drops, so if you are looking to buy around
Wickenburg then you could not pick a better time, especially with
interest rates so low.
Land:
The demand for land has been much lower than normal of late even
though the availability is quite good. I attribute that to a couple of
factors. One factor is the cost of new construction, which has climbed
considerably this year The other factor is the asking prices of the land
that is on the market. The asking prices of land are actually higher in
many areas than they were in 2005. Looking on the bright side we have
actually seen a number of price reductions, and still continue to see
new listings to the market. So I wouldn't say that the values of land
are dropping, just that the asking prices are falling back to reasonable
numbers, that will in many cases still be comparable or even higher than
the banner year of 2005.
* When I mention an average I will exclude 2005 which was a most unusual year in Real Estate.
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