Real Estate Inverse Relationship = Good News for Buyers AND Sellers

Whether you look in Phoenix or Tucson, by city, zip code, or even price range there is an interesting phenomenon going on at the moment the number of active listings are increasing as is the month-over-month sales.

Arguably this is good for both buyers and sellers–Buyers, because they are finding more choices: sellers, because, generally speaking, prices have started to appreciate (or recover, if you want to think of it that way).

Looking at the above graphs you can see that the longer trend has been the tightening of supply (active listings), with demand (sales) being fairly robust, but frustrating for buyers starved for choices.

It is the increase in inventory with sustained demand that makes this particular market snapshot interesting.

Will the trend continue? It’s hard to say. The holiday season typically puts a damper on buyer and seller motivation. And then there are the post election unknowns. But for now, we see a more balanced, and hopefully sustainable market.

Boring Real Estate Update : ) - Summary....Recovery Going Well For Maricopa County

November 13 - The 90-day average rate for Notices of Trustee Sale in Maricopa County is now 90 per day. This is the lowest rate since September 2007. We would regard a rate of 60-70 per day as within the normal range. The peak was 325 in April 2009.

November 12 - Normal sales within Greater Phoenix are currently selling for about 97% of list price. [ This is what I call the Trading Range - proof of the 'efficiency' of the market] This is somewhat above the average of 96.21%, but well below the peak of 99.55% reached at the height of the bubble on June 5, 2005. This measure is a good gauge of how hot the market is at any point in time. The lowest level reached in the last 12 years was 90.80% and this level occurred on February 5, 2009 when it was extremely hard for normal listings to compete with the flood of lender owned properties.

November 11 - We mentioned yesterday that house prices (in terms of average $/SF for monthly sales) were currently increasing by about 2% per month. In fact the rate as of November 11, 2012 is 2.3%. This is actually slightly lower than the rate measured last year on November 11, 2011, when it was 2.7%, having risen from $80.10 to $82.25 between October 11 and November 11, 2011. The annual appreciation rate is currently 27.5% and it has fallen in the 26.0% to 28.7% since the end of September. One year ago the annual appreciation rate was a negative 2.0%.

November 10 - The increased contribution from the luxury market that we mentioned yesterday is having the effect of pushing the average price per sq. ft. higher. This is the reverse of what happened during the summer when its weakness dragged the averages lower. The average price per sq. ft. for monthly sales is today at $105.13 (the overall average for all types & areas) - the first time we have exceeded $105 since November 17, 2008. Together with the current imbalance between supply and demand, the upward pressure is sufficient to raise average sales $/SF by 2% per month.

November 9 - The luxury market is picking up nicely after a slow summer. There were 71 closed ARMLS sales during October for Greater Phoenix homes listed over $1,000,000. This compares well with only 49 for October 2011, 49 for October 2010, 65 for October 2009 and 55 for October 2008. Listings under contract (pending and AWC) are also on the rise for homes priced over $1,000,000, This morning we had 148, far more than the 105 we saw on November 9, 2011. Of these 148, 117 were normal listings, whereas we had only 69 one year ago.