St. Louis Real Estate – Market Watch May 31st, 2008

St. Louis Real Estate Market Watch by Art Wagner @ Keller Williams Realty Southwest, Sunset Hills, Mo.
May 31st, 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 has hit a “road block” it seems. Active listings are stagnant, with fewer homes accepting contracts. Thus, our pending ratio has fallen by one percent this week.

This could be the the start of another smalll market slow-down, which we predicted some months ago. If so, this is a new challenge for us at this time of year, when we usually continue to see activity increasing.

Now, with mortgage rates hovering around 6 percent for a fixed 30 year mortgage, buyer’s excitement has waned a bit. According to Freddie Mac, growing concerns over inflation has prompted the rates pushing up at this time. There is also some concern that the Federal Reserve Board may be looking to increase short-term rates by as much as 25 basis points later this year.

If you’ve been to the grocery store and gas station lately, and who hasn’t, we can certainly see that food and gas prices are fanning the flame of inflation. The Labor Department issued a report on Thursday that applications for unemployment insurance rose last week also.

To add more fuel to the fire, a report issued Tuesday claimed that U.S. home prices fell by 14.1 percent in the first quarter of 2008.

REMEMBER-REAL ESTATE IS VERY LOCAL. In spite of all this new doom and gloom, our statistics, and others in the St. Louis area show that we remain in a very stable marketplace. Our recent statistics actually show that on an average, St. Louis County is seeing a small increase in average list prices and a small increase in selling prices for homes here.

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 a FREE Comparative Market Analysis and additional information tailored to your specific needs.

St. Louis Real Estate St. Louis County Market Watch May 31st, 2008

St. Louis Real Estate Jefferson County Market Watch May 24th, 2008

St. Louis Real Estate St. Charles County Market Watch May 31st, 2008

St. Louis Real Estate Benchmark Report April 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 Friday, June 6th, 2008 at 11:53 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.