Minneapolis Real Estate Market Gains Weight

chocolateThe Minneapolis real estate market is like someone who just can’t stop eating.

No matter how much it needs to not put another piece of chocolate in its mouth without also working out, it just can’t seem to keep itself from reaching for another piece.

For the last 12 weeks, the number of single family homes for sale in the market has been higher than it was a year ago; 8.1 percent higher to be exact.

And it’s growing because buyers aren’t out there to help work off the pounds of excess inventory.

For the week ending August 21, there were 601 purchase agreements signed. That’s 40.6 percent less than a year ago.

Duplex and small multi-family sales fared better however. While pended sales were down 10.7 percent year over year, the amount of new inventory also declined by 9.75 percent.

Of those properties that received purchase agreements, just 20 percent were signed by traditional sellers. This is down slightly from last year’s 25 percent. While the average off market price was $119,492, faring better than last year’s sold price of $113,148, it’s important to remember we won’t know until the sales have closed how near list price those transactions were for. In this market, odds are the “getting” price was below the “asking” price.

Traditional sellers brought 32.43 percent of the new inventory to the market for the week; a healthier showing than last year’s 22 percent of the new offerings.