A recent report from the National Association of Realtors highlights a national trend. The overall inventory of homes for sale, based on a months-of-inventory metric, trends low – indicating a seller’s market. Said the other way, buyers have a low inventory of homes from which to choose, which affects prices. On a wider scale, this trend reflects and affects mobility and the duration of ownership. Other findings by the NAR show these to be true. Their recent survey indicates an all-time high of how long sellers stayed in their home before selling.
On a local level, we see reflections of this trend. Across all MLS listings locally, the months-of-inventory on closed sales is just under 4 months. This is well off the “balanced-market” inventory of 6 months. Moreover, this number incorporates luxury listings (over $500k). Local luxury listing are sitting on more than 15 months of inventory. Imagine what inventory in the non-luxury portions of the market looks like if you move the luxury listings out of the total number.
Turning to our normal appraisal of transaction volume (for sellers on more than one monthly transaction) for folks we associate with development and new-construction, we find 173 deals in October. See attached data. Assuming this relates to lot sales and new-home sales, we believe this to be another strong indication of local effort.