Apologies for the tardiness of the August report. We’ve been doing some under-the-hood work. To make it up to you, I’m including Movers Moving Indexes for August AND September.

Looking to Year-Over-Year MLS data for Lubbock, in September 2019 we saw a 17.7% decrease in listing totals (1138 vs. 1384 in 09-2018), a 1.5% decrease in sales (383 vs. 389), and a minor fluctuation of the Months of Inventory YoY – down from 3.6 to 3. The Luxury Market (over $400k) varied a bit. It showed a 22.7% decrease in listings (170 vs. 220), a 32% INCREASE in sales (33 vs. 25) which affected MOI considerably (6.1 now vs. 11 on 09-2018). Do we have lower mortgage interest-rates to thank for relatively strong sales offsetting contractions in listings?

Our friends at Texas Association of Realtors published their 2019 Texas Homebuyers and Sellers Report. Key findings include (i) the highest perceived difficulty in the market was simply finding the right home, and (ii) the top reason for buying a newly-constructed home was avoiding renovations or plumbing and electrical problems. The most popular reason for listing a home? To move closer to friends and family.

Our Movers Moving Index turned in an impressive 172 transactions in August and stayed strong into September with 146 transactions. See attached.