St. Louis Real Estate-Market Watch October 19th, 2009

Real Estate-Market Watch by Art Wagner @ Keller Williams Realty Southwest Saint Louis , Sunset Hills, Mo.
October 19th, 2009
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 is starting to follow our typical Fall trends with fewer new active listings. Of the active listings out there, we are still seeing pending ratios (homes accepting contracts) well above the 20 percent mark in the lower price ranges.

The St. Charles County market is on FIRE in their lower price ranges. In the $100,000 to $125,000 range, 42 out of 75 active listings have accepted contracts in the last 30 or so days, for a pending ratio of 56 percent-AWESOME! The other two price ranges, $125,000-$150,000 and $150,000 to $175,000 are also showing great activity with pending ratios at 44 and 33 percent, respectively.

In these lower price ranges in St. Charles County, inventory levels are at 3 months and below. Our St. Louis County inventory levels in these same price ranges are very low also, at 3.2 to 4.3 months of inventory.

Buyers in these price ranges won’t have the luxury of being too particular, or waiting for a price adjustment before deciding to write a contract. If they don’t do it now, the home will probably be gone by next week.

This type of activity is being seen all across the country, as the First Time Home Buyer’s Tax Credit heads toward it’s expiration date of November 30th. We also see the awesome low interest rates, and the great value for the dollar as contributing greatly to this activity.

The Mortgage Banker’s Association, National Association of Realtors and National Association of Home Builders got together last week and drafted a letter to Treasury Secretary, Geithner, HUD Secretary Donovan, and National Economic Council Chair Summers, in support of an extension of the Tax Credit and stating that it has had a major impact on the housing market stabilization and the U.S. economy as well.

They state, among other items, that new home buyers spent an average of $12300.00 on furnishings, repairs, appliances, etc.. where the current homeowner only spent an average of $8900.00. This spending, they state, has helped create jobs, and help boost our over-all economic situation.

Read the letter for yourself, and see if you agree with them-we do. Click Here to read the article, courtesy of RISmedia.com.

WHO DO YOU KNOW NOW that is challenged with their mortgage payments OR needs to sell for less than their home is worth?? WE CAN HELP!!

WHO DO YOU KNOW that’s thinking of buying or selling a home?

Contact Doug Aegerter or Art Wagner for more information and a FREE Comparative Market Analysis (CMA) of your home or your neighborhood.

Fill out the form below to view the Market Report

This entry was posted on Monday, October 19th, 2009 at 3:16 pm 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.