They say its a long road to reconstruction. That sure has been true as it applies to the position of strength for a seller of real estate for the last 5 plus years. Buyers had all the cards and sellers were left playing Indian Poker. Long lists of options and not a lot of prospective buyers created a reality for sellers that discouraged many owners from listing the Sea Isle house for sale. They wanted to sell but did not believe that they could get a good price or even get any offer at all.

In January of 2012 the worm started to turn. We saw stronger sales volume than we had in previous years and the solid activity continued through the Fall. Inventory that had been listed and re-listed for years was finally cleared out and the prospective buyers began to lose the advantage position. As 2012 closed I was wondering if that solid year would be followed up by another strong selling season or if we would fizzle out as we had with some other false alarms in the past 5 years.

This is what has happened so far.

The 2013 prospects began showing up in solid volume as soon as the new year began and they were immediately confronted with lists of possible options that were painfully short. I was out with a customer last week and they only had 3 houses they could look at that fit their needs and in the past 7 days, all of them have sold. For the first time in a long time the market is not delivering more product that it can sell and the buyers are being forced into the difficult position that was the exclusive province of sellers since 2008. Only time will tell how this is going to go but it’s nice to have a more balanced condition. It’s healthier and in the long run, better for both sides of the aisle.

Steve Freda

For the first time in over 6 years there are indicators that the market does not favor Buyers over Sellers. I do a lot of work with statistics and a recent review of MLS data revealed some facts I would like to share with you. But first a little background.

In real estate there is a kind of formula that is founded on the idea that it should take between 9 and 12 months to sell a house. So if you were to take that idea and apply it to 100 properties listed for sale, you would want to see around 100 sales in the past 12 months to consider it a balanced condition. For a very long time the market was way out of balance as the number of properties listed for sale ballooned. But it’s not like that today. In fact the pendulum is swinging quickly towards the other side of the arc.

Here are some numbers.

In the last 12 months, at the price point between $500,000 and $600,000, 47 units were sold. The year before a total of 40 units were sold. That represents a 17% increase. The graph goes on to detail the same relationship in three other price points. This is very good news for Owners as increased volume is generally a harbinger of increased property values.

But for owners that have thought about selling it is the numbers below the graph that you should focus on. These are the number of  town homes that are for sale right now. Going back to the 500 to 600k price point you will see that only 20 units are available. That is a very short number relative to the volume of 47 units sold that we saw in the last 12 months. 3 of the 4 sections show the same shortage and represent an overall opportunity to sell in a market condition that finally does not favor the buyer over the seller. If you have considered selling or would just like to talk about the market in a general way, then just give me a call at 609-263-5301 and we can go over whatever it is that is on your mind specific to the property here in Sea Isle. Thank you and Happy Holidays