By Chad & Sara Huebener
The pool of sellers entering the market in West Savage is beginning to cool. New listings are down, and total West Savage inventory remains well below average. Typically we see an average of 25-28 listings in our West Savage marketplace during any given month. Current listing inventory hovers around 16 – just 60% of the norm.
Pending sales have also cooled in the past 45 days. Buyer activity in early September was slow with the start of school, but picked up again in mid-late September. West Savage just experienced a boost in closed sales which included a number of foreclosures, short sales and vacant properties. As disheartening as this may be for traditional sellers, our marketplace as a whole needs to see the absorption of these properties if we are to have any hope for market recovery. Getting some of these homes “off the books” before winter is essential, as vacant properties during Minnesota winters tend to fetch even lower sales prices. Vacant, foreclosed and short sale properties remain in our marketplace, and continue to pop up from time to time.
What to watch for: Based on past experience, we expect to see a slight seasonal spike in buyer activity prior to Thanksgiving. We are starting to see some signs of market stabilization as well. We do not expect to see appreciation or a recoup of prior home values for a number of years. However, the falling of prices is starting to slow. It will be interesting to watch how pricing and buyer activity affects market times in the next six months.
Inventory is down for Savage as a whole and Scott County. This is typical of this time of year, and we expect to see this remain pretty steady through the winter.
Our West Savage absorption rate has dropped to 4%. That means if zero new homes come on the market, it will take 4 months to sell our existing inventory. This is a nice, low absorption rate!
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