Comment
Well, after weeks at the top of the charts, seller-assisted down payments fell completely out of the top 40 last week. And it appears the Minneapolis/St Paul housing market isn’t humming along the way it had as a result.
While the impact of the disappearance of the FHA down payment program is only a theory, statistics released by MAAR yesterday do reflect a drop in pending sales. Yes, sales were still ahead of the same week last year; to the tune of 3.5 percent. However, this figure is 15 percent below the increases marked in the last four weeks.
Of course, one week isn’t enough to either prove or disprove any theory. And home sales continue to surpass those logged in 2006; which most of us considered a pretty good year. Listings are also down 12 percent as compared to the same week last year, and 9.1 percent lower for the year. However, if this decline was in fact due to the end of programs like Nehemiah, Genesis and Ameridream, any thoughts as to the level of activity we’ll see as we near the $7500 tax credit deadline?
The charts for the small multi-family market, on the other hand, continued to dance right along. Pending purchases were up a whopping 369.23 percent over last year’s figure. A full 92 percent of the transactions for the week ending October 6 involved lender-involved seller. Just 61.5 percent of last year’s activities included lender involvement.
It is worthy to note that the average price of the 48 multi-family units whose sellers accepted purchase agreements was $98,082. The average sales price for the properties sold last year, however, was $163,500. A 40 percent weekly drop certainly isn’t indicative of an annual total. However it is tough to imagine that next year’s figures for the first week of October will reflect anything like a similar decline.
It must be a great time to buy.
Comment
While the nail-biting news continues over on Wall Street, the Twin Cities real estate market continues to hang on by its strong fingertips.
MAAR released its weekly report of buyer activity last night, and the trend of the previous five reports continued into a sixth. In the week ending September 13, pending sales rose 23.3 percent over the same week in 2007. In fact, in the last six weeks, 1269 more purchase agreements were signed than in the same span last year.
New listings of single family homes also continued their downward trend, signaling a tightening of inventory. New listings for the week were down 13.4 percent over the corresponding week last year; with the annual total down 9.3 percent from the 2007 mark.
The multi-family housing market fared equally well. New listings for the week were down 8.6 percent from last year, while pending sales were up 41.18 percent.
Of the properties with accepted purchase agreements, 85.29 percent of the 2008 mark were lender-involved transactions. This figure is 13.8 percent higher than the level of bank involvement last year.
Comment
Last night MAAR released its weekly activity report for the week ending August 2. While it may be too soon for outright optimism, there are a few less reasons for despair in Twin Cities real estate market.
For the fifth straight week, and the ninth of the last twelve, there were more purchase agreements written on houses than there were during the same period last year.
Overall, sales were up 2.2 percent from their mark last year. In fact, in the last three months, pending sales have been steadily .6 percent ahead of last years. And, get this. New listings for the week were 19.8 percent lower than last year, making the average number of new listings over the last three months 12.8 percent lower than one year ago.
While all of this is good news, we’re not there yet. The average number of days a house sits on the market before it sells is 146. This is 13.3 percent higher, or 19 days longer than it took one year ago.
Meanwhile, Minneapolis and St Paul area duplex sales continued to chug along. Pending sales were up 195% over the same period last year, with 41 registering accepted purchase agreements, vs the 21 that did last year.
It’s clear the mortgage crisis had really begun to impact the market around this time last year, with 61.9% of those purchases being lender-involved transactions. Sales for the week this year, however, were comprised of 92.6% foreclosure or short sale properties.
Comment
The Minneapolis Area Association of Realtors released its weekly Market Activity Report last night. And once again, there are encouraging signs in the Twin Cities single family home market.
The inventory of available single family homes is down 5.5 percent from the same time last year. There are presently 32,978 homes available on the market, which is about 2000 less than there were at this time last year.
MAAR attributes this decline to a 16.5 percent drop of new listings, as well as an increase of newly signed purchase agreements (pending sales) of 5.1 percent for the same year-over-year comparison.
These numbers create yet another promising barometer. The present Supply-Demand Ration indicates 8.68 homes for sale per buyer. This is a decrease of 4.2 percent over last year. A balanced market is one with an average of 5 homes available for every buyer active in the marketplace.
Meanwhile, the small multi-family market continues its salmon-like behavior, running upstream compared with the rest of the market. Newly signed purchase agreements for the week ending July 25 were up 410% over the same time last year (41 in 2008 to 10 in 2007).
While 40 percent of last year’s transactions involved a bank owned or short sale property, this year’s figure reflected 90 percent lender-involved activity.
It’s too soon to predict anything. We’ll continue to wait and see.
Comment
As it does every Monday, the Minneapolis Area Association of Realtors (MAAR) released its weekly activity report last night for the week ending June 21.
New listings continued their decline from last year, dropping 10.6 percent when compared to the same week last summer. This has been the trend for the last 16 weeks. In all, the total number of homes for sale in the metro area is down 2.6 percent from the same time last year.
Pending sales were also behind those of last year: 1.8 percent. This has been the case for nine of the last eleven weeks.
The multi-family market, however, continues its surge. Pending sales for the same week were up 150% year-over-year.
Something of interest is this time last year seemed to show a spike in the number of transactions involving either short sales or bank owned properties. Last year at this time, 45.45% fit in this category. This year, a full 87.8% of the pended properties involved a lender negotiated sale. While this is still an increase, it is not nearly as grand as I have reported in previous weeks.
Meanwhile, new listings for the week numbered 49 this year; a drop of 56 percent over the same time last year.
Nothing scientific here, but a trend I have personally noticed is well-priced, owner-occupant type properties, whether bank or privately owned, seem to be moving at a healthy clip. Inventory of these types of properties isn’t as plentiful as it was a few weeks back, and if open house traffic is any indication, there are plenty of buyers looking
