Brenda's Tucson Housing Market Report
June 2011

Active Listings Drop Below 6,000 for the first time in 5 Years!

Average Days On Market = 80 ~ Sales Price as a % of List Price = 95.42%

Sales Volume Shows Steady Increase: Sales Volume (Total Dollars of Sales) has increased every month this year. January had 130 Million & change for the month and May sales ended at just over 210 Million in Sold inventory. Buyers have definitely been active over the last several months. We expect a dip this summer then a gradual increase thru the last few months of the year.

Days on Market: Dropped again this month to 80. As inventory decreases (which it is), days on market will decrease. In January we were at 108 days on market and we now stand at 80. This is a positive sign of an improving market.

Active Listings Drop Below 6,000: The last time we had less than 6,000 active listings was Way Back in December of 2005! We now stand at 5,795. This is extremely positive for the market. It is an indication that finally, the flood of short sales and repos is slowing. We still have a lot of distressed sales to work through, but we believe we are past the worst of it.

Where are all those buyers coming from anyway? Well, here's the chart.
Inbound Migration to Pima County

It's Been a Bumpy Road: It's been rough the last few years but we believe we are well past the worst of it. Arizona is poised to come out of this faster than a lot of the country. Sounds crazy, more Realtor hype, I can read your minds:-) Well it all has to do with "Shadow Inventory". Shadow inventory is generally defined as "houses that are in some stage of foreclosure, but have not yet reached the market".

Basically Arizona has been Very Proactive in moving foreclosures through the system as fast as possible allowing us to clear out the excess inventory of distressed properties at a faster rate than most other states. This graphic shows that Arizona has fewer months worth of shadow inventory than almost all other states. This is a positive indication that we will come out of this downturn early while other states will take much longer.

Feel free to contact us with your questions. We're easy to talk to and we can answer any questions you might have about current market conditions, interest rates or where home prices are headed. If you're interested in talking about listing your home we'd be happy to provide our recommendations on how best to proceed.

Key prior month statistics from the Tucson Association of Realtor’s April 2011 Report show:

Total Tucson Home Sales Units: 1247, Decreased 1.81% from May 2010. Increased 8.25% from last month.

Total Tucson Homes Under Contract: 2,239, Increased 132.50% from May 2010. Decreased 14.21% from last month.

Tucson Average Sale Price: $168,453 Down 13.54% from $194,838 in 2010.
Northwest Tucson Average Listing Price: $215,9462 Down from $226,202 last month.
Catalina Foothills Average Listing Price: $400,668 Down from $408,127 last month.

Total Tucson Active Listings: 5,795 Down 14.05% from 6,742 in May of 2010.
Northwest Tucson Active Listings: 1,516 Down 98 units from last month.
Catalina Foothills Active Listings: 589, Down 31 units from last month.

Total Tucson New Listings: 1,251, Down 212 units from 1,463 in May of 2010.
Northwest Tucson New Listings: 293, Down 59 units from last month.
Catalina Foothills New Listings: 123, Up 2 units from last month.

Some quick conclusions we can draw from these Tucson home sales statistics are:

Positive Market Indicators this month: Sales volume steadily increasing, Days on market steadily decreasing, Inventory Declining with Active listings reaching 5 year lows, New Listings Down.

Negative Market Indicators this month: Average Sales Prices still creeping lower (again, this is actually a positive factor as it will continue to stimulate more buyer interest).

Market Outlook: We expect the market to begin slowing down as we enter Summer, the next few months could be pretty rough but things should pick up when Fall comes around. If you're a seller now, spruce up your home as much as possible and make it Shine!

Low Ball Offers: After our comments on low ball offers last month a client asked "What about sellers who are asking unreasonable prices, how do you handle those?"

Well, one way is that we personally will not take an overpriced listing, there is no point in listing a home at a price that we don't think it can sell for. So all our listings are priced correctly:-)

Sometimes however, there are in fact overpriced listings. The first thing we do when we find a home we think is overpriced is to call the listing agent and just ask them "We're having trouble comping this one out, are we missing something? What do you have that supports the listing price?" They'll usually give us something, but usually it's not enough and we still think the home is overpriced.

If that happens, we suggest to our buyers that they make their offer where our comp's indicate it should be & we just do our best. We point out to the sellers agent that we just don't think it will appraise at the asking price. Sometimes when the appraisal comes in low the sellers see the light & will agree to a lower price and sometimes not. We always do our best to negotiate these difficult ones but sometimes we just need to move on to the next home.

The Tucson Market Reports below will give you a detailed look inside the current Tucson Housing Market.

Questions about current Tucson Housing Market Conditions?
Email Brenda or call her Today at 520-918-5968
Return to Tucson Real Estate Home Page

Tucson Home Finder	Tucson Community Info	Helpful Tucson Links	All About Brenda	Tucson Home Buyers	Tucson Schools Info	Tucson Golf Courses	Tucson Home Sellers	Tucson Housing Market
Brenda's Tucson Listings	Oro Valley Homes	Dove Mountain Homes	Monthly Tucson Newsletter	What People Say	What's My Value Today	Tucson Home Mortgages	Tucson Condos & Town Homes	Tucson New Homes
Homes By School District	Catalina Foothills Homes	Rancho Vistoso Homes	Tucson Retirement Homes	Tucson Luxury Homes	Tucson Golf Homes	Tucson Gated Homes	Northwest Tucson Homes	Other Tucson Homes