Hello from Las Vegas! The weather here is great this time of the year. Today, October 3rd, it is outstanding. The general market information that I will address is just a short overview of the present situation.
If you look to the overview page on my web site you will see that this market, for free standing homes, bottomed December 2011 with a median selling price of $119,000. The high was June of 2006 with a median selling price of $319,000. This last month the median selling price was $220,000. That was a 7% increase from prices one year ago.
This reflects a fairly stable market with price increases just a little higher than the historic average of around 5% per year. It has, however, been a wild ride the last few years. Distressed sales, foreclosures and short sales, are down by quite a margin. Having said that, 25% of homeowners are still underwater, owning more than their home is worth. That is much better than the high of around 50% just a few years ago, but it is still a significant number. New home sales are up. Builders pulled 696 permits in August, up 17% from a year ago. The yearly total of new homes sales through August was 5,506, up 12.7 % from the previous year. That is much better, but still way off the highs of around 30,000 new homes built per year just a few years ago.
Interest rates on home loans are still very low. That is a big plus. Overall, it is very much a mixed picture. It is very difficult to project into the future what this market will look like. I had many clients in late 2011 believing, based on what they read, that the market was going to go lower still. Now it has recovered about 2/3 of the losses from the 2006 to 2011 period.
I personally think it is a very comfortable market right now, for both buyers and sellers. It is stable and that is a good thing, in my opinion. Gone, for now, are the periods of wild fluctuations and gone are the days of larger entities snapping up all the attractive properties. Buyers, especially those who needed to finance, had a especially difficult time during that period.
That’s it for now! Look to my overview page for more detailed information. Feature photo is from Summerlin. The largest of the local planned communities and has reflected, as has the rest of the valley, the highs and lows of the last few years. I will feature Summerlin in my next blog
