October and November Stats

October and November Stats are out (hence the double post). The tax credit has had an undeniable influence on the numbers in the past two months. As you can see from this graph, the number of closed sales is up over the past 4 years! Even more sales in October 2009 than October 2005. The average sales price in October fell from $111,038 in October of 2008 to $105,293 in October of 2009.

As for November…well, hold on to your seats kids because the clouds parted in November. The average sales price went up from $99,384 in November of 2008 to $112,445 in November of 2009. Did you hear me? The average sales price went UP! This hasn’t happened since 2006! The number of sales was way up as well, from 323 in 2008 to 454 in 2009. Well, I guess one thing is for sure…Washington does have the power to influence the actions of Main Street with their policies. I believe that most of this can be directly attributed to the first time home buyer tax credit, which was originally scheduled to expire on November 30, 2009.

August Statistics

Sorry about the long delay for stats. Here is the latest from August (still waiting on updated numbers for the last few months) Click here for a full set of stats. In August we again had more closed deals than last year (558 in 2009 as compared to 530 in 2008) but the average sales price continues to decline, dropping to $114,554 from $124,148 the previous year. If you look back a few months, however, the average sales price is up over prices from earlier this year. What does it all mean? Who knows? Ask Obama.

June Statistics

Well June’s numbers are out and they again are a mixed sort of bag. Once again sales are up over the previous year…538 closed in June of 2009 as compared to 502 in June of 2008. The average sales price is down again over last year, $111,948 versus $129,390 for the same period last year. The good news is that this figure is well above the average sales price just a few months again, which was hovering in the low $90s. First time buyers and investors continue to drive the market. When will we hit bottom? I have no idea, but I know that in 15 or 20 years people will be saying, “I should have bought a rental house back in 2008 or 2009″

May Statistics

Well, I guess I am a bit behind on my statistics. I know that quite a few of you enjoy the stats, so I still wanted to post them (also we are still waiting on June’s stats) Our average sales price was up yet again over the previous month, but still down sharply year to year. We also had quite a few less sales than last year, 416 as compared to 518 for 2008. I still think that this market has quite a bit of potential for investors looking for a long term buy and hold strategy, but if you are looking to buy a place for yourself, make sure you can see yourself living there for at least 5-7 years as the market continues to be quite volatile.  For a complete look at the statistics click here.

April Statistics

Well it seems like at least half of the homes that I have been writing offers on lately have been getting multiple offers and even getting bid up over the asking price. Certainly this must eventually translate into higher sales prices? Well finally our statistics are out for April and we saw the average sales price go up almost 4% over March. True we are still down year on year quite a bit from last year, but you have to start somewhere! Our closed sales are up as well, though just from 486 in 2008 to 490 in 2009 for April. This is still more than the 458 deals that closed in April of 2007.  Is that a light at the end of the tunnel?

Average Sales Price (April)

March Statistics

The March statistics are out and Mid-Michigan officially continues to be a buyers market. Our sales for last month were off slightly from the year before. Realtors in the area closed 354 transactions versus 394 for the same time period last year. Sales prices continue to take front and center, however, dropping to an average of $91,415 in March of 2008 as compared to $118,169 for March of 2007 (a drop of 23%)

The good news is that foreclosures were down dramatically in March. According to local news WLNS, foreclosure filings in Clinton County were down 55% from last year, Ingham was down 42%, and Eaton down 31%. Keep your fingers crossed that foreclosures continue to decline.

Lansing Market Update: February Stats

Anyone that knows me will tell you I love my statistics. I track everything from my google analytics website traffic to how many of you are reading this blog right now. I think that statistics can be a very helpful tool. Because of that I am going to start doing a market update every month so that you can get the same statistics that Realtors in Lansing are getting. So how was February for real estate in Lansing? Well from a sales standpoint it was great. The Greater Lansing Association of Realtors as a whole closed 327 transactions, up from 272 last year (a 20% increase!) However, the average sales price continues to decline. We fell from an average price of $106,855 in Feb. or 2008 to just $93,501 in 2009 (a 12.5% decrease) This is actually an increase over January’s average sales price of just $88,000.  What can we deduce from all these numbers?  Well, we can say for sure that properties are still selling if you get them to the right price.  And for those you that are still clinging close to an appraisal you had done in the Fall of 2006, it is time to face the reality that prices are just not where they used to be.  For a full list of our statistics check out this link.