Charleston real estate market report, June 08 home prices

August 1, 2008 | Leave a Comment

Charleston home prices show a slight decline on both an average and median basis in single family homes under $600,000. This housing classification represents over 70% of all Charleston real estate transactions and is therefore the most important category to best understand market conditions and trends.

While the average price declined by 3.22% and the median price declined by 3.32%, the Charleston remains much healthier than many other housing markets around the country.

Prices continue to show increases for luxury Charleston homes and both clasifications of condos and townhomes.

Statistics compiled by Howard Arnoff using the Charleston MLS as the source of data, information deemed reliable but not guaranteed.

Charleston real estate, Charleston home prices

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Charleston real estate market report, June 08 sales and inventory

July 31, 2008 | Leave a Comment

The left axis (red line) represents unit sales and you can clearly see the trend of fewer sales during the first half of this year compared to last year. The right axis (blue line) represents inventory which has remained at elevated levels.

Charleston real estate June 08 sales and inventory

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Charleston real estate market report, home prices May 2008

June 26, 2008 | Leave a Comment

Sometimes you just can’t make stuff up. All the talk in the media is how home prices are dropping faster than a rock (and a big rock, more like a boulder going downhill) and yet the Charleston real estate market continues to show prices actually increasing despite slower sales and high inventory levels. As I’ve said on several occasions, the law of supply and demand doesn’t seem to apply to Charleston home prices.

You’ll note increased unit sales in the luxury condo classification since a large development in Wild Dunes recently closed. It tends to “skew” the numbers somewhat just like several years ago when we saw a lot of condo conversions in the market and unit sales of lower priced condos were significantly higher than in previous years.

Statistics compiled by Howard Arnoff using the Charleston MLS as the source of data, information deemed reliable but not guaranteed.

Charleston real estate home prices

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Charleston median home prices 2000 to 2008

June 25, 2008 | Leave a Comment

Charleston real estate prices

 

The median price for homes in Charleston has climbed steadily during the decade (data is from May of each year) and while there hasn’t been much appreciation in the past 2 years, that is certainly better than what is being reported around the country.

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Charleston real estate, sales and inventory May 08

June 24, 2008 | Leave a Comment

Inventory remains high in the Charleston real estate market while sales remain below year ago levels. The surprise is that prices remain firm on both a median and average basis and I’ll be posting those numbers in the next day or two.

Sales are in red and correspond to the left axis and inventory is the blue line corresponding to the right axis.

Charleston home sales and inventory

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Charleston real estate market report, April 2008 home prices

June 4, 2008 | Leave a Comment

It appears the law of supply and demand hasn’t quite reached the Charleston real estate market as yet because with fewer sales and increasing inventory, you would think that prices might have declined a little more. And while anecdotal evidence does confirm pricing pressure, the statistics haven’t quite caught up as yet.

I use a running 12 month average for the past 12 months compared to the previous 12 months on the chart below. But for those of you who really want to see some price declines, the median home price in the Charleston real estate market declined from $210,000 in April 2007 to $199,900 in April 2008. The median price however is just the middle price of all recorded home sales and since there have been more sales of lower priced homes than higher priced properties, the median has declined while actual prices seem to have held up a little better.

Statistics compiled by Howard Arnoff using the Charleston MLS as the source of data, information deemed reliable but not guaranteed.

Charleston real estate home prices

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List (asking) price vs sales price May 2008

May 31, 2008 | Leave a Comment

Charleston real estate prices

With almost 12,000 homes currently available for sale in the Charleston real estate market which is almost a 16 month inventory if no additional homes come on the market. 

If you really want to sell your home, you must price it to sell.

As you can see, the asking price is significantly higher than the prices paid by buyers in all classifications with the only exception being luxury condos and townhomes.

The current sales price to list price according to Charleston MLS statistics shows that homes are selling at a 5.23% discount to list.

That is the highest rate I’ve seen yet asking prices are even higher per the chart above. Something has to give and my best guess is that it won’t be the buyer.

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Charleston home prices

May 29, 2008 | Leave a Comment

Charleston real estate home prices

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Median and average home prices in the Charleston real estate market over the past 12 months. Despite declining unit sales, high levels of inventory, prices have remained fairly stable.

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A picture is worth a thousand words

May 12, 2008 | Leave a Comment

… and charts may be more helpful than spreadsheets.

I’m pretty tech savvy but when I need really “geeky” help, I turn to my favorite geek, my friend Jay Thompson, The Phoenix Real Estate Guy, who by the way, is very proud to be geeky.

I was wondering how to post more graphics on my website and blog like I had seen on Jay’s and others that I noticed on the Internet. After all, a picture is worth a thousand words. And in a second, he said, SnagIt.

What you can do is capture, edit and share anything you see on your computer screen. So for those of you who would rather have a visual understanding of market trends rather than just the numbers of an excel spreadsheet, SnagIt allows you to capture a chart created from the data and easily post it to your blog.

Here is an example of average vs median prices for the past 12 months in the Charleston real estate market (red is average, blue is median).

Charleston real estate median and average sales prices last 12 months

What do you think?

 

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Charleston South Carolina market report, March 2008

April 29, 2008 | Leave a Comment

The Charleston real estate market seems to defy gravity when it comes to home prices. While the median price declined by about 5% from March 2007 to March 2008 for all sales in the Charleston area, when you analyze the most recent 12 month period and compare it to the previous 12 month period and when you break the housing market into classifications by price and type of property, the picture is not as gloomy as the media might make you think.

Don’t misunderstand for a moment that the Charleston South Carolina real estate market is soaring and doesn’t have a problem in the world because obviously, that just isn’t the case. Inventory started to increase over a year ago and sales started to decline at about the same time. While inventory has stabilized with the possible exception of Charleston luxury real estate, unit sales continue to decline from previously lower levels.

It’s probably a combination of fear of buying because of the doom and gloom reported by the media, a fear of paying too much because you think your home might be worth less tomorrow and certainly, the unavailability of previously available mortgage products to those who can no longer qualify for a loan.

Anecdotal evidence seems to point to sellers finally understanding that their home is no longer worth what it might have been at the peak of the market in 2005. Some have decided to take their home off the market and stay put, others are renting their home rather than sell for less than they think it might be worth. There are some foreclosures available at good prices, although the condition is generally poor at best. There are some homeowners in trouble and there are a bunch of “short sales” in the MLS, unfortunately, the sale can’t be negotiated without the approval of the lender or lenders and they have been generally unresponsive. And there are some motivated sellers who simply have to sell and good deals are available. 

The most important thing is to analyze and understand the real value of the property and make an offer that will not be spurned as insulting yet not pay the asking price. If the property is well priced, while you shouldn’t have to pay list price, you are not going to be able to get it at a big discount. Actually, if a property is very overpriced, you more than likely won’t bother to view it.  

Statistics compiled by Howard Arnoff using the Charleston MLS as the source of data, information deemed reliable but not guaranteed. 

Single family homes

Under 600k        
Dates Sales Avg Sale Median Sale DOM
4/1/2006-3/31/2007 10,651 $231,543 $205,798 57
4/1/2007-3/31/2008 8,069 $230,954 $205,000 77
Change -24.24% -0.25% -0.39% 35.09%
Over 600k        
Dates Sales Avg Sale Median Sale DOM
4/1/2006-3/31/2007 1,092 $1,112,033 $869,500 106
4/1/2007-3/31/2008 778 $1,156,888 $850,000 149
Change -28.75% 4.03% -2.24% 40.57%

 

Condos and townhomes

Under 600k        
Dates Sales Avg Sale Median Sale DOM
4/1/2006-3/31/2007 3,223 $191,337 $174,900 49
4/1/2007-3/31/2008 2,386 $211,198 $180,000 88
Change -25.97% 10.38% 2.92% 79.59%
Over 600k        
Dates Sales Avg Sale Median Sale DOM
4/1/2006-3/31/2007 186 $967,539 $801,775 94
4/1/2007-3/31/2008 186 $967,683 $872,500 102
Change 0.00% 0.01% 8.82% 8.51%

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