Breakdown of the stats in the words of our broker:

Active Listings are down once again, which marks the third straight month that the inventory is down.  But…this time of year, that is typically what happens, so that should be no surprise.  What is striking is that the only other year when there were fewer listings was in 2006.  Remember 2006?  Ahhh…the good old days.  We are not alone, however.  According to a report from the TAR Digest, REALTOR.com reports a 20 percent drop in the number of homes for sale across the U.S. during the 12 months that ended in September.  The drop is being attributed to owners who don’t want to sell at a discount and instead, are removing their homes from the market and are waiting it out.  I wish the drop was due to the fact that the inventory was being bought up, but that is not the case, which likely means that prices will stay low.

Closed Units in September have dropped from August, although that is also a seasonal trend.  I think the bright spot here is that they have remained fairly steady over the course of several months, including those months where we usually see a pretty strong upward spike of sales (May, June, July and August).  Sure, we would have been pumped to see a spike this year, but the steady-as-she-goes progress tells me that our area has a pretty strong baseline of business that happens, regardless of what the market is doing.  The really good news is that we are above where we were in September of last year.

Months of Supply is up.  I keep pointing back to the season, but in the past six years, the supply number has increased in September in every year except one, so this trend is expected.  With about 17 months of supply, it’s still lower than in any of the previous three years.

Last year January through September, there were 7,855 closed units.  This year, it’s 7,142 so the MLS as a whole is down.

Keep your sellers properly adjusted on price and let your buyers know that prices are low and it’s time to go!

Click each graph to enlarge