Fast facts as of March 8, 2013
New homes – Sales are up 50.4% for the last 12 months, prices up 4% for the same period. New home builders are benefiting from the tight resale market. Still with 5,686 closings for 2012, there is a long ways to go to match the new home sales figures of just a few years ago.
Resale homes – Median prices have held steady for the second month at $130,000. Compared to the prior year prices are up 30%. Sales are off 23.7% for January, compared to the previous year. There is presently a 1.6 month inventory of homes, considering the present rate of sale. There are around 11,000 homes in contingent status with 81.4% identified as short sales.
General observations – This is a tough market for buyers! Inventories are very low with lots of buyers chasing very few listings. My recent experience has been that homes priced under $200,000 that look to be good value are seeing multiple offers. Even in the higher price points there is considerable competition amongst buyers. As tough as it is, it may still be worth the effort, as today’s prices may look like steals in another few months. Foreclosures are practically at a standstill, even though Nevada leads the nation in loans that are 90+ days delinquent.
The big question – This is an unusually protracted period of limited availability with tens of thousands of homes either in default of awaiting short sale approval. If this apparent log jam breaks, through legislative action or otherwise, how will this affect prices over the next 12 months? The expectation of many has been that there will be a large number of foreclosures entering the market. That has been an expectation for at least the last 14 months. Will it come and even if it does, given so much buyer pressure right now how will it materially affect the price rises that look to be coming? I have no crystal ball, but every month that goes by makes me less certain that any sort of glut of inventory is coming and even if it does, that it will make much difference.
