Bellevue Real Estate » Scorecard

Weekly Scorecard 2-15-10

George Thurtle — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 04:45:23 +0000

Still no big increase in inventories. I would expect more homes coming to the market this time of year no matter what the market conditions. EB had a mild increase from 212 to 220 and the areas held steady. Sales and homes going pending in EB seem somwhat slow so we will have to keep an eye on that area. SB had 13 homes go pending this week. The per sq. ft. spike in the sales price for SB is caused by a $4,000,000 waterfront home closing.

Here is the spreadsheet: Weekly scorecard 2-15-10

Weekly Scorecard 1-11-10

George Thurtle — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 02:48:33 +0000

The numbers don’t say a whole lot this week. Overall volumes were low, particularly in West Bellevue. Of the two pendings however one was a tear down. South Bellevue had a number of pending sales at 10, will have to see if this an indicator of future volume. Overall inventories took a slight bump up as homes started being brought to the market for the new year. Probably will see this number move up the next month. Overall a little mopre activity than I thought we were going to see.

Click here for the spreadsheet: Weekly scorecard 1-11-10

Weekly Scorecard 1-4-10

George Thurtle — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 03:16:09 +0000

Here is the first report of the new year and new decade. On the surface it looks like a big drop in inventory but I would say it is not what it appears to be. A lot of listings are set to expire year end; I know I had six; so it is hard to make any trend of the inventory number. A more accurate trend will probably not appear until the end of January as these homes get relisted. The big news which the spreadsheet does not show is the ramping up of new construction sales that are not forclosures. In MLS Area 500 4 of the 5 pe ndings were new construction. While there was pressure on the pricing these were not bank homes or short sales. Camwest had homes sell in both South Bellevue, West Bellevue and East Bellevue. Eric Campbell at Camwest has always done infill and been very price sensitive and I think he is going to have a good spring sales season if interest rates remain stable. In West Bellevue the numbers look low for the prices but that is because half of the sales were for tear downs. It appears with the depletion of the new construction inventory thatthe building cycle is starting again. In the upper end no one is going to build speculative homes so it is presale or custom homes if the buyer wants a new home. Don’t expect to go out in the market anymore and find nuch suitable with the new construction inventory most of it is left overs.

The spreadsheet link is here: Weekly scorecard 1-4-10

Weekly Scorecard 12-28-09

George Thurtle — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 01:01:49 +0000

Here is the report for the Weekly Scorecard from the “Nothern International Office” of East Bellevue Real Estate. Overall the same trends continue declining inventories, soft pricing and homes priced at or below the market are seeing multiple offers and sale prices over the list price. The sales volume is good for this time of year. Sellers seem more willing to accept the market realities and list closer to where the buyers think the market is at. As a result we see increasing sales volumes, declining inventory and flat pricing. However it appears if the seller is willing to list at the market price a number of buyers are willing to make offers.

The big issue is to see what happens the first part of the year and how the new Washington State Foreclosure Laws will affect the amount of bank owned inventory.

Here is the link for the spreadsheet: Bellevue Weekly Scorecard 12-28-09

Weekly Scorecard 12-14-09

George Thurtle — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 01:27:19 +0000

This week the inventories were at 239 homes just up two from last week. Inventories do not appear to be climbing. There were four sales this week with prices ranging from $350,000 to $550,000; pretty typical for East Bellevue. The average per sq. ft. sales price was $222 per sq. ft. Again pretty typical. There was one bank owned home and one short sale. This is the most we have seen in a long time in any batch of sales.

There were three pending sales this week. One of the them was a $5,800,000 waterfront on Lake Sammamish. The other two were homes under $400,000 so running averages this week would be meaningless but it will be interesting to see what the closed number of the $5,800,000 waterfront is if it closes.

Next week there will be a different format. I will be adding West Bellevue and South Bellevue and start presenting the numbers in a spreadsheet format as the site transitions to one which includes all of Bellevue.

Weekly Scorecard 11-30-09

George Thurtle — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 01:44:06 +0000

The inventory just seems to stay pegged around the 240 number. This week it was 241 homes. Seven homes sold this week; again a pretty good number, especially for this time of year. There was one short sale in this batch of closings and one new Camwest Home. The average per sq. ft. sales price was $214, under the predominate average of $214. The average home sale price was $542,929; slightly above the usual $500,000 average. However it looks like we have hit the wall reagrding pending sales. This week there was “0″. They had been tapering off lately with last week only seeing three sales. This is most likely due to the time of year. Things really slow done but will need to see how this trend plays out. Pricing appears flat and the market appears to be very price sensitive.

Weekly Scorecard 11-9-09

George Thurtle — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 00:02:47 +0000

Well the inventory appears to be oscillating around the 250 number. This week it is 254 homes, an increase from 243 homes the week prior. Inventories bottomed at 237 homes three weeks ago and then bounced up to 253 homes and then dived to 243 homes and have landed at 254 this week. I wouldn’t be surprised to see them over 260 next week. But let’s see what happens.

The volume of sold homes continued to be robust at 9 homes this week and only one bank owned home in the bunch. Very typical numbers with the average per sq. ft. sales price being $225 and the average home sale price was under $500,000 at $478,222. These are numbers that are very typical for East Bellevue and represent where the market has been at since May when it bottomed.

The pending home sales were the interesting story this week. In the previous weeks the pending home sales volume was pretty low. One week as low as 3 homes. Also the per sq. ft. sales listed price of the pending homes were lower than the closed sale prices. However this week there was 7 pending sales with the per sq. ft. average list price of $235.11 and an average list price of $634,271 for the home overall. All of this suggests some up swing in pricing.

Usual story. Sales appear to keep happening as long as the price is right.

Weekly Scorecard 11-2-09

George Thurtle — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 01:14:29 +0000

Well I thought the inventory would keep gradually building but shows what happens when I try to make a prediction. This week we saw a slight drop to 243 homes so it dipped back under 250 homes. Traditionally a low number for East Bellevue. There was the largest number of sales yet in a single week with 15 closed homes. Two of which were waterfronts. Excluding these homes the average per sq. ft. sales price was $226 per sq. ft. lower then in the past weeks number but very close to the traditional East Bellevue average per sq. ft. price of $220. The average home sale price was $554,808 a somewhat higher average for East Bellevue which is usually around $475,000. There was only one short sale in this week’s sold homes and no bank owned homes. Five homes went pending this week and the average per sq. ft. sales price was $225. However the average listing price was $650,550 very high for East Bellevue. Just as a note the pending homes’ average initial list price was for the sold pendings was $847,990. Looks like if the sellers wanted a sale they had to come down quite a bit on their asking prices.

Again things look stable. The per sq. ft. average sales price was in the usual $220 per sq. ft. range the inventory does not appear to be growing excessively. It is obvious the buyer will buy if the pricing is right.

Weekly Scorecard 10-26-09

George Thurtle — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 02:35:20 +0000

It appears the overall inventory is marching back up. It is now 252 homes. Three weeks ago it bottomed at a little over 230 homes. However this is not a lot of homes for this market which can run over 300 homes but it looks like as our sales volume decreases due to increasing prices and seaonality factors that the inventory is starting to creep back up. Will probably keep heading higher until Q1 next year.

Closed sales this week were 7 homes. Not bad. The week previous had 10 sales but it appears overall sales volumes are slowing down a bit. Average per sq. ft. prices are drifting back to the $220 per sq. ft. and are down from last week’s $235 to $229 this week and overall the average home sale was price was back down to under $500K at $491,514 very typical numbers for East Bellevue. There appeared to be no bank owned or short sale homes in this batch of sales.

Like last week the pending sales volume was low at only 3 homes. The average per sq. ft. price was $219 per sq. ft. There was one short sale in this batch of homes. This is a home that had been pending forever; a short sale new construction home so that one is a little suspect. However the important part is not the specific homes but the overall trend line. If you remember in June we saw the market bounce happen when pending sales vome and per sq. ft. prices were higher than the previous week. Now we see a new trend of lower pending sales volume and per sq. ft. pending prices. Looks like we have had a good little bounce and we will level back out at our traditional numbers.

As I said last week I think we are in a “trading” range where volumes and prices will decline until they get at or under $220 per sq. ft. and then we will probably see sales volumes and sales pick up and move us over the $200 per sq. ft. number. Will probably keep trading around this number until we start seeing real growth in the overall economy.

Weekly Scorecard 10-19-09

George Thurtle — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 01:26:51 +0000

The inventory after a BIG drop three weeks ago to 234 is slowly creeping back up. This week there are 245 homes listed for sale up 8 homes from the week’s previous 237. There were a large number of sold homes this week, 10 in total. They ranged in price from $370,000 to $1,800,000. There was one bank owned and one short sale. I took out the one sale at $1,800,000 which was a waterfront and the averages for the 9 homes was a sales price of $531,667 and average per sq. ft. sales price of $232. Closer to the prevaling $220 per s. ft. number than last weeks. However there were only 3 pending sales. In additon the average per sq. ft. sales price of the pending sales was only $210 per sq. ft. prices ranged from $395,000 to $700,000. This is the same trend as last week a large number of sold homes and a lesser number of pending homes. Looks like values have peaked and are going to settle back down to $220 per sq. ft.

Overall this time of year sees decliging sales volumes however I suspect the spike in prices has also slowed down sales. The buyers I am talking to are very price sensitive and have the position they will wait it out to get the buy they want. It appears that we are headed into a “trading range” where prices fluctuate betwwen $220 and $240 per sq. ft. The big driver on pricing will be if the amount of distressed inventory increases. The amount distressed inventory the more downward pressure on pricing.