Portland’s RMLS released our July market statistics today and there was a fair amount of not-so-great news and a couple of positive points.  At the bottom of this post are highlights taken from RMLS’s Market Action. 

In my book, the bad news is that the number of closed sales is down from June to July.  However, this shouldn’t be a big surprise to anyone in the real estate business due to the expiration of the first time home buyer tax credit.  The fact that pending sales remained stable from June to July is a bit of a bright spot in my book. 

In August we usually see a lull in real estate activity because a lot of people (and especially Realtors) are on vacation.  In addition to that, many buyers are looking to the beginning of September and the start of school rather than looking at houses.  There is typically a boost in business in September to October.  Then again, there isn’t a whole lot that is “typical” about our market these days.  So, it’ll be interesting to see what happens. 

Another bright spot is that the average and median sale prices increased from June to July by 2.5% in both cases.  I wouldn’t get super exited about this yet, though.  Part of the increase could be attributed to the expiration of the first timer tax credit.  I think that the tax credit stimulated the lower end of the real estate market which caused a lot more properties priced under $250,000 to close, thus dragging down the average.  I’ll be curious to see what happens with sales prices over the next couple three months.  I’m not being pessimistic – just cautious. 

I still have quite a number of buyers who are getting ready to pull the trigger.  The things that have these people eyeing the market are some super sweet deals on real estate and interest rates that are ridiculously low.  I spoke with a banker yesterday who said he could get an interest rate below 4% on a 15 year fixed loan. 

Give me a call if you have any questions about these stats or about what’s going on in your neck of the woods. 

       -Ron-

From RMLS’s Market Action:

“July Residential Highlights

When comparing sales activity in the Portland metro area in July 2010 to the same time last  year, July 2009, closed sales declined 29%. Pending sales also decreased 24.9% and new listings rose 3.1%.

On a month-to-month basis, when comparing July 2010 to June 2010, closed sales fell 29.8% (1,412 v. 2,012), while pending sales grew 0.7% (1,629 v. 1,618). New listings also fell 0.5% (4,029 v. 4,049).

At the month’s rate of sales, the 15,271 active residential listings would last approximately 10.8 months.

Sale Prices

The average sale price for July 2010 increased 2.9% compared to July 2009, while the median sale price went down 1.6%. See residential highlights table below.

When comparing July 2010 to the month prior, June 2010, the average sale price increased 2.5% ($297,000 v. $289,000) and the median sale price also went up 2.5% ($246,000 v. $240,000).

Year-to-Date

Increases are seen when comparing January-July 2010 with the same period in 2009. Closed

sales were up by 22.5%. Pending sales also went up 9.1% and new listings grew 6.8%.”