St. Louis Real Estate-Market Watch March 28th, 2008

St. Louis Real Estate Market Watch by Art Wagner @ Keller Williams Realty Southwest, Sunset Hills, Mo.
March 28th, 2008
The Anatomy of St. Louis Real Estate

The St. Louis Home for Sale Team provides a weekly St. Louis County and Bi-weekly St. Charles County Market and Jefferson County Market Watch Report to review and plug into your home buying or selling scenario. Your questions and comments are welcome! 

 

The St. Louis Real Estate Market this week continues in our usual Spring trends with increased active listings, a pending ratio very close to 16%, and our average list prices just inching up slightly.  In most price ranges, though, we are still below the average list prices we saw a year ago at this time.   Our inventory levels in St. Louis are remaining in that Transitional range of 5–7 months, with 6 price ranges falling below 6 months of inventory.

With these levels of inventory and buyer activity increasing, we see most of the price ranges are still within a 2% – 3% market when you compare listing price against selling price. It’s important to remember that these are six month averages, and it still holds true that the longer a home is on the market, the more likely it is to sell below that 2% – 3% average. 

Granted, the National news regarding housing and the over-all economy is not very encouraging right now, but for buyers and sellers in the St. Louis Market, it still remains a good time to buy or sell if you need to be in the marketplace.  Also, bear in mind that our St. Louis Real Estate Market, or any real estate market for that matter, is VERY local and is affected greatly by the area’s macro-economics as well as the National economic trends.

According to RISMedia, the Fed’s rate cut last week has helped comsumers in some ways, however, our “credit crunch” is still not likely to end much before the end of the year.  With the rate cut, comsumers may see a reduction in rates on credit cards, car loans, and other various comsumer loans, along with rate reductions in certificates of deposit and savings accounts. The rate cut won’t necessarily make mortgages cheap and easy again, as lending requirements have tightened and investors and traders are still not running to buy mortgage backed securities after being burned in the past.   Read the complete article at RISMedia.

Now add in the fact that consumer confidence plunged to a five year low in March. To quote RISMedia again, “The Conference Board, a New York based industry group, said it’s comsumer confidence index dived to 64.5 in March, down dramatically from February’s 76.4 and significantly short of the 73.5 reading that many economists had been anticipating.”  This sounds like even the “experts” are uncertain as to where and when this market will turn around.  To read the rest of this article, go to RISMedia.

 

 For some great information regarding the real estate market and a really cool home-value calculator, check out the report just released by the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight (OFHEO) at http://www.ofheo.gov/.

Thinking of buying or selling a home? Contact Us for additional information tailored to your specific needs.

St. Louis Real Estate St. Louis County Market Watch March 28th, 2008

St. Louis Real Estate Jefferson  County  Market Watch March 22nd, 2008

St. Louis Real Estate St. Charles County Market Watch March 28th, 2008

St. Louis Real Estate Benchmark Report March 2008

The report begins by breaking the market into 17 distinct price ranges. Then we show current listings and current pending listings which creates a pending ratio, which is helpful on a week to week basis to see if activity is increasing or decreasing in a price category. 

The report also shows the last 6 months of results and compares the data to the same 6 months of the previous year. 

The Market Analysis includes data on: 

Number of Active Listings (Current)
Pending Sales (Going to closing)
Pending Ratio (Active vs.Pending)
Sold (Last 6 months)
Expired (Last 6 months)1
Average List Price
Average Sale Price
Average List to Sales Price %
Days on Market (DOM)
Months worth of Inventory (Based on current pending rate)
Buyers Market: > 7 months of listing inventory

Transitional Market: 5 - 7 months of listing inventory (sometimes called a “balanced” market)

Seller Market: < 5 months of listing inventory

Average % Sale Price/List Price (0-30), (31-60), (61-90), (91-120), (120+)DOM
           
Notice that you’re paying a penalty for over pricing. . .hey. .it’s a fact!!  

The Benchmark Report is produced monthly for:

• Single Family Residence
• Ranch Style
• 1300 - 2000 sq.ft.
• 3 Bedrooms
• 1.5 Bathrooms  

 

Art Wagner can be reached at art@stlouisrealestatevoice.com

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 30th, 2008 at 10:46 am and is filed under St. Louis Market Reports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.