This weekend’s open house at 2390 Baggett Drive was a great success. Most people that came to see the house were seriously looking for a new home. Together with the feedback from other agents that investors have started ‘bottom fishing’ and that some of the ‘great deals’ have attracted multiple offers I have come to realize that we sort of know were the market is at and that’s a good thing. Also the interest rates are historically low and might even go lower.
As promised some stats for Sonoma County, yes, our area has been hit hard in certain price ranges.We had a fairly high percentage of people that bought homes with the dreaded negative arm that adjusted recently. Our area is not as bad as other areas (Fresno for instance) but certain parts of Santa Rosa do have a lot of short sale listings and REO listings.
The first I am going to share is the 2 years overview of inventory:
As per December 31, we had 3385 properties for sale (Dec 2005: 2304) and in that same month 217 properties sold (Dec 2005 : 343). In 2007 March was the top month with 428 properties sold in that month. Interestingly enough, the year before the top month was in June with 522 properties sold. So no matter what you might think, homes DO sell, the numbers are proof of it.
Regarding the market: as Realtors, we do preview and show quite a bit of homes. It’s usually very clear why homes don’t sell: besides the pricing issue there is also the showing issue: a lot of homes show dirty, cluttered and not kept. It’s beyond my comprehension why people don’t at least clean their house before putting it on the market and keep it clean while being on the market. If you don’t do it for your prospective buyers, please do it for the poor Realtor that you hired to sell your house or the ones that preview or show your home: it’s depressing to show or preview a dirty house!
Thanks and have a great day!
Mirjam de Rijk (Mirjam@c21alliance.com)