Weekly Scorecard 10-11-10
The market appears to be starting to “normalize”. The pending sales numbers and the closed sales gap is starting to narrow. As has been mentioned previously that gap was running 2 to 1 with closed sales out numbering pending sales. The gap, as speculated, was mainly due to the expiration of the artificial stimulus caused by the home buyer tax credit. When the tax credit excpired the number of pending sales dropped dramatically. Now we are finally seeing the last of the sales stimulated by the tax credit. In the next month or so we should start to see what the market reallyt looks like without this stimulus.
Inventory and sales are declining but it is hard to tell if this is just the usual seasonal fluctuations or has to more with overall market fundamentals. Really won’t know until next spring. However this time of year is good for home buying as there is less competition and those sellers who need to sell will be under pricing pressure. Another issue to keep in mind is that banks are particularly motivated this time of year to move “aged” inventory and get it off their books to take further write downs. The banks weant to clean up their balance sheets and reduce the aged inventory as much as possible as they head into their annual reviews next year.
The spreadsheet is here: Weekly scorecard 10-11-10