Archive for April 2010
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HOW LONG did you say this house has been on the market? |
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 Apparently, long enough for the ivy to grow through the windows! But on a more serious note --- or at least more focused on data..... In the past year, there have been 828 home sales, 97 of which took longer than a year to sell, which is 12% of the home sales. There are currently 989 homes on the market for sale, 192 of which have already been on the market for more than a year, which is 19% of the active inventory. If we assume it would take another 60 days for any of these active listings to sell, we find that there are 250 that have been on the market for at least 10 months --- in other words, 25% of the active inventory. So, it would seem --- no big surprise --- that there are many more homes on the market than there are buyers to buy them. This, thus, results in many homes languishing on the market. Of note, as I mentioned earlier this week, we're not really headed in the right direction. So far this month (Apr 1 - Apr 28) we have seen 217 new listings come on the market in Harrisonburg and Rockingham County, and in that same time only 57 sold. Conclusions & Directives:
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April 2010: A Reason To Hope, A Reason To Laugh |
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 Over the last several years, we have seen fewer and fewer (and fewer) homes sell each year in Harrisonburg and Rockingham County:
In the first 115 days of 2010 (Jan 1 - Apr 25) we have seen:
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Everything Will Sell, At A Price |
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This is a story of quickly rising, and quickly falling real estate values. In Harrisonburg. Despite a relatively stable overall housing market.  Some parents of JMU students buy an investment property for their son or daughter to use a a residence while at JMU, and many of these parents have historically bought condos and townhomes at Hunters Ridge. Let's take a look at sales trends for each over the past several years:  As you can see here, prices of Hunters Ridge condos and townhomes had steadily (sometimes rapidly) increased for many years before arriving in 2009. Last year, Hunters Ridge sales slowed down to a snails pace --- with only one condo sale in the entire year, and only 3 townhome sales. Good news --- townhomes and condos are starting to go under contract again. Bad news --- it's because the prices have dropped very low! At the moment there are 5 condos on the market at the $60,000 price point, which is well below any recent sales price. There are also townhomes on the market for only $70,000. Some conclusions:
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Harrisonburg vs. Charlottesville, Comparing Home Values |
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Let's take a quick look at 1st Quarter Median Sales Prices over the past few years --- comparing Harrisonburg to the Greater Charlottesville Area. Take a look here for the CAAR report where I derived these figures:  Take a look at the differences in these two markets:
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Home Sales Slow, Prices Remain (Somewhat) Steady In Harrisonburg, Rockingham County |
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Click here or on the image below to view the full April 2010 Harrisonburg & Rockingham County Real Estate Market Report (PDF). Read on below for a few highlights.  Mixed indicators this month . . .
  Also of note, we have seen a steady increase in Inventory over the past several months. Lots of options for buyers --- lots of competition for sellers! Don't delay -- get all of the exciting (and not as exciting) details and beautiful charts by downloading the full April 2010 Harrisonburg & Rockingham County Real Estate Market Report (PDF). If you find the information in this report to be helpful....
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The Buyers Are Back! |
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Greetings, blog readers. My sporadic content creation of late has been a result of being busy working with buyers and sellers. I'll soon be releasing my monthly market report, but in the meantime, I thought I'd see if my own recent increase in sales activity was an indicator of a wider market trend. Indeed, it seems that buyers are re-entering the market. We saw just as many buyers signing contracts in March 2010 as in March 2008, after a big dip in March 2009. (see below)  Then, looking at the first three months of each of the past several years, we see this same shift in buyer activity. (see below)  It will likely be at least a month before this translates into an increase in closings, but it almost certainly will given these large increases in buyers deciding to buy. Of course, this could be related to the deadline of April 30th for buyers to commit to a property in order to be eligible for a tax credit. | |
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Scott Rogers
Funkhouser Real
Estate Group
540-578-0102
scott@funkhousergroup.com
Licensed in the
Commonwealth of Virginia
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