July Sales Report: Six Steps Forward, One Step Back
It seems to me like the July real estate figures for Pinellas County show that we've taken six steps forward and one baby-step back. We had six consecutive months of nice steady growth this year, but July was kinda flat and perhaps a bit off where we were all hoping the market would go.
Let's take a look ...
As usual, we'll take a quick look at the Absorption Rate (AR) for the county. As you all know by now, the Absorption Rate is the inventory turn and it is calculated by dividing the number of units sold in a month by the total number of units in the Multiple Listing Service.
For single family homes, the July AR was 11.1%. That is the same AR that we had in June, so statistically there was no improvement in single family sales (no statistical reduction either, and that's a good thing). For condos, there was an insignificant reduction in the AR from June to July. The AR for July was down a little to 6.9% from June's 7.0% -- that doesn't amount to much. So, statistically, let's call it an unchanged market from June through July.
Single Family Sales
While statistically the market was unchanged, the actual number of listings and sales show some losses. In July, the number of single family homes listed for sale was reduced to 6,525 from June's 6,702. To be honest, the inventory of homes listed has fallen every month in 2009, and I think that is a good thing for sellers who have a little less competition each month. For buyers, maybe it's not such a good thing since they have fewer choices. Overall, we have to reduce this flood of inventory that has clogged the real estate market for the past few years if we are ever going to get to a point of market equilibrium.
Single family home sales were reduced for the first month this year. In June there were 746 houses sold, but in July only 722 sales were recorded. I don't think this is such a big deal. If you go back and look at sales over the past four or five years like I did while writing this story, I found that single family home sales always, repeat always, drop in July compared to June. So, I'm thinking no big deal just normal seasonal market activity.
The median price for a single family home in Pinellas County fell from $180,000 in July of 2008 to $140,000 in July of 2009. That's a drop of 22.2% year over year.
Condo Sales Info
Condo sales seemed to track right along with single family homes sales. Pretty much the same kind of statistics and numbers that we saw in June.
The number of condos listed fell from June's 6,059 to July's 5,954 -- about one hundred fewer units on the market. Condo inventory has fallen every month this year, so I don't think this is anything to be alarmed about.
We finally had a decrease in the number of condos sold in 2009 during July. In June there were 422 condos sold, but in July only 412. That's a statistically insignificant difference and, like single family homes, the number of condo sales always drops from June to July in the past few years so I think that's just seasonal buying.
The median price for condos in July of 2008 was $152,000 but it fell to $128,000 in July of 2009, a drop of 15.8% year over year.
One word about median prices. I think the drop in median prices shows that more people are buying lower priced houses and condos. This is probably in part due to the increase in first time buyers taking advantage of the government's $8,000 stimulus program and the general reduction in prices as compared to 2005-2006 pricing. It will be interesting to see what happens to median prices when the stimulus program comes to an end later this year.
So, that's what happened last month. Pretty much a repeat of June's numbers with perhaps a slight step backward but nothing to really worry about.
Let's take a look ...
As usual, we'll take a quick look at the Absorption Rate (AR) for the county. As you all know by now, the Absorption Rate is the inventory turn and it is calculated by dividing the number of units sold in a month by the total number of units in the Multiple Listing Service.
For single family homes, the July AR was 11.1%. That is the same AR that we had in June, so statistically there was no improvement in single family sales (no statistical reduction either, and that's a good thing). For condos, there was an insignificant reduction in the AR from June to July. The AR for July was down a little to 6.9% from June's 7.0% -- that doesn't amount to much. So, statistically, let's call it an unchanged market from June through July.
Single Family Sales
While statistically the market was unchanged, the actual number of listings and sales show some losses. In July, the number of single family homes listed for sale was reduced to 6,525 from June's 6,702. To be honest, the inventory of homes listed has fallen every month in 2009, and I think that is a good thing for sellers who have a little less competition each month. For buyers, maybe it's not such a good thing since they have fewer choices. Overall, we have to reduce this flood of inventory that has clogged the real estate market for the past few years if we are ever going to get to a point of market equilibrium.
Single family home sales were reduced for the first month this year. In June there were 746 houses sold, but in July only 722 sales were recorded. I don't think this is such a big deal. If you go back and look at sales over the past four or five years like I did while writing this story, I found that single family home sales always, repeat always, drop in July compared to June. So, I'm thinking no big deal just normal seasonal market activity.
The median price for a single family home in Pinellas County fell from $180,000 in July of 2008 to $140,000 in July of 2009. That's a drop of 22.2% year over year.
Condo Sales Info
Condo sales seemed to track right along with single family homes sales. Pretty much the same kind of statistics and numbers that we saw in June.
The number of condos listed fell from June's 6,059 to July's 5,954 -- about one hundred fewer units on the market. Condo inventory has fallen every month this year, so I don't think this is anything to be alarmed about.
We finally had a decrease in the number of condos sold in 2009 during July. In June there were 422 condos sold, but in July only 412. That's a statistically insignificant difference and, like single family homes, the number of condo sales always drops from June to July in the past few years so I think that's just seasonal buying.
The median price for condos in July of 2008 was $152,000 but it fell to $128,000 in July of 2009, a drop of 15.8% year over year.
One word about median prices. I think the drop in median prices shows that more people are buying lower priced houses and condos. This is probably in part due to the increase in first time buyers taking advantage of the government's $8,000 stimulus program and the general reduction in prices as compared to 2005-2006 pricing. It will be interesting to see what happens to median prices when the stimulus program comes to an end later this year.
So, that's what happened last month. Pretty much a repeat of June's numbers with perhaps a slight step backward but nothing to really worry about.
-30-
posted by Terry Ward at 4:08 AM
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