Status of The Southern Utah Real Estate Market for July 2009

Sorry I am a bit late. I guess the endless supply of summer obligations and frankly some fun; have kept me from posting until now. I had a great July, thanks to all of you for your help and efforts in keeping the Doors of ExSell Realty open and operating. I would especially like to thank the following for their closings this month:

1. Boyer Green Valley LC (Listing Sold)
2. Daniel and Karissa Holloway (Purchase)
3. Bart and Diane Imlay (Purchase)
4. Scott and Cathy Alexander (Listing Sold)
5. Mark Hammond GRC (Listing Sold)
6. Greg and Lona Clarke (Purchase)

Pat Moffat the project manager of The Overlook at Green Valley has been awesome to work with for the past year or so, Daniel and Karissa are wonderful people that were referred to me by Blake Bench of Bank of America, thanks Blake, Bart and Diane Imlay are long time family friends and neighbors, Scott and Cathy have two siblings that are both past clients of mine, Arica Demarcus-Dadjou and Dave and Trish DeMarcus and Mark Hammond is a REO asset manager that happened to put me to work on a project, and Greg and Lona Clarke are some wonderful people that I serendipitously bumped into in the middle of the woods one day, and they happen to buy the cabin I listed with Mark. Thank you all.

Look for the “Who Do You Know?” home tour. I am planning to start videoing each week for the last three weeks of each month and posting them on this blog so check it out. I am interested in your feedback.

Here is what is going on in the market, there is a bit of movement out there and total sales are up compared to a dismal first quarter. According to the Washington County Board of Realtors Multiple Listing Service, Homes closing escrow in the Greater St. George and Hurricane Valley increased from 218 in the month of June to 247 in the month of July, so the trend looks positive.

According to our friends at Southern Utah Title, if you add the MLS information to the by owner, and by builder and you add in the other areas on the MLS that I did not report on, such is the North West and North East corridors, they report a 363 sales in July, up from 304 in June. Either way you look at it, things are up.

Here are the numbers broken out in each category.

Total Market Activity on Homes in July
Active Listings: 1,572 (June 1,352)
New Listings: 408 (June 308)
Sold Listings: 242 (June 213)
Months of Inventory: 6.50 (June 6.35)

Homes priced up to $150,000
Active Listings: 285 (June 246)
New Listings: 106 (June 65)
Sold Listings: 56 (June 39)
Months of Inventory: 5.09 (June 6.31)

Homes priced from $150,001 to $200,000
Active Listings: 304 (June 258)
New Listings: 82 (June 80)
Sold Listings: 64 (June 56)
Months of Inventory: 4.75 (June 4.61)

Homes priced from $200,001 to $250,000
Active Listings: 253 (June 206)
New Listings: 63 (June 55)
Sold Listings: 41 (June 41)
Months of Inventory: 6.17 (June 5.02)

Homes priced from $250,001 to $300,000
Active Listings: 176 (June 151 )
New Listings: 43 (June 26)
Sold Listings: 22 (June 28)
Months of Inventory: 8.00 (June 5.39)

Homes priced from $300,001 to $350,000
Active Listings: 114 (June 98)
New Listings: 26 (June 20)
Sold Listings: 16 (June 12)
Months of Inventory: 7.12 (June 8.17)

Homes priced from $350,001 to $400,000
Active Listings: 89 (June 91)
New Listings: 24 (June 15)
Sold Listings: 16 (June 14)
Months of Inventory: 5.56 (June 5.79)

Homes priced from $400,001 to $450,000
Active Listings: 47 (June 42 )
New Listings: 15 (June 5)
Sold Listings: 5 (June 5)
Months of Inventory: 9.40 (June 8.40)

Homes priced from $450,001 to $500,000
Active Listings: 46 (June 45)
New Listings: 8 (June 6)
Sold Listings: 7 (June 2)
Months of Inventory: 6.57 (June 22.50)

Homes priced from $500,001 to $550,000
Active Listings: 30 (June 28)
New Listings: 8 (June 5)
Sold Listings: 3 (June 2)
Months of Inventory: 10.00 (June 14.00)

Homes priced from $550,001 to $600,000
Active Listings: 46 (June 42)
New Listings: 8 (June 4)
Sold Listings: 5 (June 3)
Months of Inventory: 9.20 (June 14.00)

Homes priced from $600,001 to $650,000
Active Listings: 21 (June 15)
New Listings: 3 (June 7)
Sold Listings: 1 (June 1)
Months of Inventory: 21.00 (June 15.00)

Homes priced from $650,001 to $700,000
Active Listings: 32 (June 25)
New Listings: 5 (June 5)
Sold Listings: 2 (June 1)
Months of Inventory: 16.00 (June 25.00)

Homes priced from $700,001 to $750,000
Active Listings: 7 (June 6)
New Listings: 2 (June 1)
Sold Listings: 1 (June 1)
Months of Inventory: 7.00 (June 6.00)

Homes priced from $750,001 to $1,000,000
Active Listings: 50 (June 45)
New Listings: 8 (June 4)
Sold Listings: 2 (June 4)
Months of Inventory: 25.00 (11.25)

Homes priced from $1,000,001 and Up
Active Listings: 72 (June 64)
New Listings: 7 (June 10)
Sold Listings: 1 (June 4)
Months of Inventory: 72.00 (June 16.00)

The following information is for building lots in the same general area as the housing data listed above. All Building Lots in the Greater St. George and Hurricane Valley

Active Listings: 1,114 (June 1,054)
New Listings: 103 (June 51)
Sold Listings: 13 (June 19 )
Months of Inventory: 85.69 (June 55.47)

Here are the data ranges:

Building lots up to $50,000
Active Listings: 63 (June 64)
New Listings: 6 (June 12)
Sold Listings: 5 (June 10)
Months of Inventory: 12.60 (June 6.40)

Building lots $50,001 to $100,000
Active Listings: 428 (June 401)
New Listings: 27 (June 18)
Sold Listings: 5 (June 5)
Months of Inventory: 85.60 (June 80.20)

Building lots from $100,001 to $150,000
Active Listings: 308 (June 307)
New Listings: 33 (June 3)
Sold Listings: 1 (June 1)
Months of Inventory: 308.00 (June 307.00)

Building lots from $150,001 to $200,000
Active Listings: 129 (June 121)
New Listings: 9 (June 10)
Sold Listings: 0 (June 2)
Months of Inventory: No sales in July (June 60.50)

Building lots from $200,001 and up
Active Listings: 186 (June 161)
New Listings: 28 (June 8)
Sold Listings: 2 (June 1)
Months of Inventory: 93.00 (June 161.00)

Short Sales:
It is estimated that about 65% of the current inventory on the MLS are short sales. I am not sure if that is true or not, but I do know there are a lot of them. I got digging around in my “year to date” sales stats and I found that over 20%, or seven of my closed transactions involved a short sale. They are going to be around for quite some time, and perhaps it would be wise to get used to it.

Foreclosures:
There are quite a few of these on the market too. I have been fortunate to have listed five so far this year, three of which have sold and closed and two that are currently under contract. I have already closed a total of six foreclosures this year, including buyers I have represented and have three more currently under contract, so needless to say, there are plenty of bank owned opportunities out there too.

I hope this information helps, Who Do You Know, that needs to buy or sale real estate? Now is the time, the market is great for those that wish to buy. Let me know how I can help. If you would like to contact me right now send me an email.