Apparently, long enough for the ivy to grow through the windows!

But on a more serious note --- or at least more focused on data.....

In the past year, there have been 828 home sales, 97 of which took longer than a year to sell, which is 12% of the home sales.

There are currently 989 homes on the market for sale, 192 of which have already been on the market for more than a year, which is 19% of the active inventory.  If we assume it would take another 60 days for any of these active listings to sell, we find that there are 250 that have been on the market for at least 10 months --- in other words, 25% of the active inventory.

So, it would seem --- no big surprise --- that there are many more homes on the market than there are buyers to buy them.  This, thus, results in many homes languishing on the market. 

Of note, as I mentioned earlier this week, we're not really headed in the right direction.  So far this month (Apr 1 - Apr 28) we have seen 217 new listings come on the market in Harrisonburg and Rockingham County, and in that same time only 57 sold.

Conclusions & Directives:

1. If you don't have to sell, don't --- it's not a great time to do so, given all of your competition with so many other listings.
    
   
2. If you have to sell (or really want to), know that it may take longer than you expect.
    
   
3. Don't believe the cartoon in yesterday's Daily News Record.....yet.....

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Over the last several years, we have seen fewer and fewer (and fewer) homes sell each year in Harrisonburg and Rockingham County:

• 2005 = 1,669 sales
• 2006 = 1,438 sales
• 2007 = 1,248 sales
• 2008 = 936 sales
• 2009 = 816 sales

Each year I (foolishly?) hope that we have finally seen the end of the ever decreasing number of home sales in our local market.  But this year, we may actually have rounded that corner. 

In the first 115 days of 2010 (Jan 1 - Apr 25) we have seen:

• 186 home sales (compared to 179 last year)
• 268 homes going under contract (compared to 244 last year)

From both of the numbers above, our market seems to be headed in a good direction.  But perhaps ALL homeowners have caught wind of this, as there is a massive number of new listings on the market:

• Last year there were 389 new listings between Jan 1 and Apr 25.
• This year there have been 629 new listings between Jan 1 and Apr 25.

WOW --- did you catch that?  That's the laugh, by the way --- that somehow our market would keep up with all of these new listings!
 

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This is a story of quickly rising, and quickly falling real estate values.  In Harrisonburg.  Despite a relatively stable overall housing market.



Some parents of JMU students buy an investment property for their son or daughter to use a a residence while at JMU, and many of these parents have historically bought condos and townhomes at Hunters Ridge.

Let's take a look at sales trends for each over the past several years:



As you can see here, prices of Hunters Ridge condos and townhomes had steadily (sometimes rapidly) increased for many years before arriving  in 2009.  Last year, Hunters Ridge sales slowed down to a snails pace --- with only one condo sale in the entire year, and only 3 townhome sales. 

Good news --- townhomes and condos are starting to go under contract again.  Bad news --- it's because the prices have dropped very low!

At the moment there are 5 condos on the market at the $60,000 price point, which is well below any recent sales price.  There are also townhomes on the market for only $70,000. 

Some conclusions:

• If you're looking for a rental property, you might want to consider Hunters Ridge.
• It will take some time (years) for Hunters Ridge prices to increase anywhere near where they had been in recent past.
• Some owners that bought at Hunters Ridge in the last several years will likely have difficulty selling without taking a big loss.
  

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Let's take a quick look at 1st Quarter Median Sales Prices over the past few years --- comparing Harrisonburg to the Greater Charlottesville Area.  Take a look here for the CAAR report where I derived these figures:



Take a look at the differences in these two markets:

• Over the past four years, the Charlottesville area median sales price has declined 19%, while the Harrisonburg and Rockingham County median sales price has only declined by 2% in the same time period.
• There was a $105k price difference between these markets, and now there is only a $55k price difference.

What other observations can you make, or what do you know about the performance of the Charlottesville real estate market?

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Click here or on the image below to view the full April 2010 Harrisonburg & Rockingham County Real Estate Market Report (PDF).  Read on below for a few highlights.



Mixed indicators this month . . .

• Home sales declined 18% from 57 sales in March 2009 to 47 sales in March.
• The median sales price decreased 5% from $211k in March 2009 to $200k in March 2010.
• The average sales price increased 3% from $237k in March 2009 to $245k in March 2010.

As can be seen below, March sales were the first month this year where the sales pace was not equal to or greater than last year.  We'll need strong April sales to catch back up to the 2009 sales pace.



Also of note, we have seen a steady increase in Inventory over the past several months.  Lots of options for buyers --- lots of competition for sellers!




Don't delay -- get all of the exciting (and not as exciting) details and beautiful charts by downloading the full April 2010 Harrisonburg & Rockingham County Real Estate Market Report (PDF). 


If you find the information in this report to be helpful....

• Feel free to share it with your friends or colleagues.
• Let me know if you'd like to meet to discuss this report and/or the particulars of your real estate situation.
• If you'd like to know even more about the housing market in Harrisonburg and Rockingham County, click here to subscribe to HarrisonburgHousingToday by e-mail or by RSS.
• Though I spend a considerable amount of time analyzing our local housing market,the majority of my time is spent helping people like you buy and sell real estate.  If you (or someone you know) will be buying or selling real estate sometime in the near future, I'd be delighted to have the opportunity to be of service.

 

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Greetings, blog readers.  My sporadic content creation of late has been a result of being busy working with buyers and sellers.  I'll soon be releasing my monthly market report, but in the meantime, I thought I'd see if my own recent increase in sales activity was an indicator of a wider market trend.

Indeed, it seems that buyers are re-entering the market.  We saw just as many buyers signing contracts in March 2010 as in March 2008, after a big dip in March 2009.  (see below)



Then, looking at the first three months of each of the past several years, we see this same shift in buyer activity. (see below)



It will likely be at least a month before this translates into an increase in closings, but it almost certainly will given these large increases in buyers deciding to buy.

Of course, this could be related to the deadline of April 30th for buyers to commit to a property in order to be eligible for a tax credit.
 

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