It's been an odd day. I've been working on the computer or around it most of the day. I don't usually sit this still, but Boo is on prednisone and needs to be walked a lot, so I decided to stay around the house and take care of him. I sent off listings and explored ideas. I checked my Facebook page which I don't usually do on a regular basis. Good news there - I re-connected after many, many years with my best friend's first husband with whom I shared travels in Ireland. Also, Rachel has the honeymoon pictures up on her page - they look so happy!
Tonight I'm showing houses to a friend of a friend of the son-in-law of one of my most prolific clients. I love referrals like that - it lets me know I'm doing a good job.
Until then -
Currently there are 139 active listings in the Skaneateles area of the multiple listing service. Three new ones came on this week, all higher end. One is a waterfront re-list in the 2.5M range. Another is also waterfront, but new at under $800,000. The third is a town listing for mid-$500,000.
One of the areas I explored was the reduction in price. I check my hotsheet frequently for all the changes that have occurred in the areas I watch on a regular basis. I took a phone call and clicked wrong - always a positive thing, it seems - and seemed to be getting reduction after reduction. They were - I had hit that category! So I checked to see the listings in the Skaneateles area that had been reduced. An impossible task, what with the sheer number of active listings and all the re-lists. But in a global sense, of the houses listed in the past 60 days only 1 (1!) has dropped the price. I went back to homes listed in the first 3 months of the year and half of them had lowered the list price, but two have actually raised it.
In the system there are only 2 properties marked contigent at the present time. There are, by contrast, 10 pending homes. Two of these are new sales, going straight to pending, and both are village properties.
There are now 46 closed homes this year. The one new one is also village, but had been on the market for a couple years. It closed at 62% of its original list price. I would wonder, if I were a buyer, why other homes haven't reduced their prices. Not, perhaps, by that much, but certainly the old rule of after four weeks if there hasn't been an offer the price should drop; it is one of the few things in the seller's control.
We do seem to be slowing down. A while back the numbers from last year in closings were 50% of this year. Now we have closed 46 and last year there were 27 at this time. Contrast that with 59 in 2007 and 64 in 2006! But remember, in all of last year there were only 66 homes that closed. We will get there and beyond that mark in 2009.
For those of you who are circling properties, indecisive and wondering what else might be around the next corner, I suggest you buy something, preferably my listings, of course. I can see an autumn filled with multiple offer situations if you don't!
