AZ Real Estate Chat

Wednesday Morning Market Update: If you want a big clue as to why our market is slowing, take a look at the graph here (from the FreddieMac website) showing the increase in mortgage rates over the last few months; Higher rates make homes more expensive, and reduce the pool of buyers who can afford them.

Wednesday Afternoon Market Update: Cooling off is great for our weather, but less good for our market. Over the last month and a half, the number of active listings is up, while the number of property visits is down. We have over 4 months of available inventory for the first time since March. Buyers will see more opportunity, and sellers will need patience to find a buyer.

Wednesday Morning Market Update: After holding steady for several months despite declining levels of activity, the median price for ARMLS sales dipped a bit in August. Surprisingly, their figures are projecting an *increase* in September. I'll need to see it to believe it, as our supply of homes is increasing while the pace of showings is slowing.

Wednesday Morning Market Update: In this week's episode of Supply vs Demand, we see that the average number of property visits per active listing is down under 1 per home. "Wow" properties can still drive a lot of interest, but in general sellers will need to be very price-conscious to draw attention.

Wednesday Morning Market Update: Okay, it looks like the uptick in activity we saw over the preceding couple of weeks was indeed just a blip in our otherwise slowing market. Last week gave us the lowest number of property showings (not counting the 4th of July week) since the first week of January, and the number of homes in escrow is down to its lowest level since the 3rd week of January. Supply continues to outpace demand.

Wednesday Morning Market Update: Following up on last weeks figures, we see that the number of active listings, and the number of coming-soon homes, both moved up a bit again. However, the number of homes sold over the last 90 days continues to drop. As a result, we have seen our supply of inventory gradually rise from 3.1 months in early July to 3.5 months today. More people are interested in selling, but so far we do not have more people interested in buying.

Wednesday Morning Market Update: To my surprise, we see a couple of indicators of increasing activity since last week, with both the number of active listings and the number of coming-soon listings moving up a bit. We will have to wait until next week to see if this is a real trend, or just a blip in our otherwise gradual slowing.

Wednesday Morning Market Update: We talked last week about how balanced supply & demand are keeping our median sales price pretty stable; this week, we have a graph to demonstrate that. We do have modest ups & downs from month to month, but over the last year it has remained pretty consistent.

Wednesday Morning Market Update: While our market has definitely slowed over the last few months (typical of our seasonal patterns), we have remained very balanced, with supply and demand ebbing at similar rates. Since the beginning of May, our supply of available homes has consistently been between 3.1 and 3.3 months. That's why our median pricing has remained relatively stable as well.

Wednesday Afternoon Market Update: Last week was a lot like the previous week, just oh-so-slightly slower on just about all of our metrics. The number of homes for sale, the number of homes under contract, the number of homes sold in the last 90 days, and the number of property showings all dipped down by a small margin. The one increase was in the number of "temporarily off the market" properties, which rose oh-so-slightly. There's not much steam in the market right now, but we are still moving down the tracks.