Weekly Scorecard 7-5-10
A week of contrast. Some of the highest closed sale numbers and some of the lowest pending sale numbers. The general accepted wisdom is that the expiration of the Federal Tax credits were the reason and in part I am sure this is true. However areas such as West Bellevue which is not tax credit dependent had 11 closed sales of which two were waterfront homes. One over $3,000,000 and the other over $4,000,000. But the number of pending sales this week for West Bellevue was “0″. This probably is the best example of the contrast. East Bellevue saw 21 closed sales this week. This was the last week you could close home sales and receive the tax credit. There was a last minute extension to allow sales which were written by April 30th to close by the end of August but in general the public perceived June 30th as the cut off date. As a result I think a number of these sales were driven by the tax credit expiration. In the same week there were only four new pending sales. The interesting issue with two of those pending sales is they were new construction presales. Also in area 500 there were new construction presales also. It appears the new construction inventory is depleting and that new homes are only being built on a presale basis due to financing and risk considerations by the builders.
Overall the character of the inventory of the market is changing with most of the new inventory sold out and some of the better resales having been sold. It appears the inventory is splitting between the really lousy bank stuff and better maintained homes. However the sellers of the better maintained homes which are not short sales or distressed property may pull their houses off of the market later in the fall as they find there is no pricing power. There will be a post on the changing character of the inventory and the market in the coming few months.
The spreadsheet is here: Weekly scorecard 7-5-10