Tuesday, November 07, 2006
Kitsap Real Estate market update for October
Median list and sale prices are leveling off, while a combination of seasonal factors and a continuing market slowdown have caused inventory to fall slightly and inventory turnover to continue to slow.
Residential Highlights…
Kitsap County’s residential inventory in October (1839 active listings) was down 3% from September. Inventory has been rising all year, so this drop must be viewed as the normal seasonal drop where sellers pull their unsold properties off the market to wait for spring. The October inventory was 51% higher than a year ago, down from 58% last month. Even the exception in Kitsap County’s rising inventory, Bainbridge Island, has a rising inventory with a 52% increase from 2005 (it was up 42% last month and 20% in August). The Bainbridge residential properties inventory is now about the same as the rest of the County. The number of YTD pending sales in October was down 13% compared to a year ago - same as last month. Note that Bainbridge Island pending sales YTD are down 20% from a year ago. The number of YTD closed sales is down by 12% compared to a year ago - up from 11% last month. Bainbridge Island closed sales YTD are down 21% from a year ago. Inventory is up substantially while actual sales are behind last year’s numbers. If you look just at last month’s closed sales, they are down 23% compared to a year ago. That’s a big drop compared to the 11% decrease we reported last month.
Prices are stabilizing…
The median sales price of $275,000 countywide was up 10% from a year ago, (same as last month). Compared to September it rose less than 1% - meaning that prices are stabilizing. Since January the median sales price has risen 7%.
Seller Expectations...
Both the median list and closed sale prices were essentially unchanged last month. The median list price has risen 7.8% since January. Sellers appear to be pricing their listings more in line with the softening market conditions. In practice our experience has been that nearly all of our listings sold in the past 2 months have had to reduce price before receiving a successful offer. The inventory turnover of homes on the market, as calculated by total number of homes on the market divided by number sold last month, is 6 months (up from 5.5 last month and 4.5 the previous month - this is a telling figure about the pace of sales). A year ago this number was 3.1 months and even lower in the summer of 2005. Based on this a seller’s home has a 17% chance of selling in any given month now versus a 32% chance a year ago. Competitive pricing is much more of a factor now than last year.
Statistics not compiled or published by NWMLS
