Brenda's Tucson Housing Market Report
May 2011

Sales Continue Steady As Spring Selling Season Winds Down

Average Days On Market = 83 ~ Sales Price as a % of List Price = 94.49%

Sales continued steady thru April: Inventory is declining slightly and may possibly drop below 6,000 units this summer. The kids will be out of school soon and our buyer profile will change somewhat to more families relocating and less 2nd home buyers as the last of the snowbirds wing their way home.

Days on Market: Dropped from 84 in March to 83 in April. We expect the number of days on market to continue a slow decline as inventory tightens up over the remainder of this year.

Lots of Recent News out there:

Multi-Billionaire hedge fund operator John Paulson says:
John Paulson Says Buy Real Estate Now

Other National Media of Note:
John Wall Street Journal on Real Estate

The Tide Has Turned: The National Media has switched from being negative to being positive about the housing industry. Expect more and more of the national pundits to pile on this bandwagon over the next year or so. With the proliferation of positive media to come the public will finally start believing in the housing recovery.

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: 1152, Decreased 6.11% from April 2010. Decreased 1.45% from last month.

Total Tucson Homes Under Contract: 2,610, Increased 66.45% from April 2010. Increased 21.28% from last month.

Tucson Average Sale Price: $173,981 Down 13.00% from $199,986 in 2010.
Northwest Tucson Average Listing Price: $226,202 Up from $210,773 last month.
Catalina Foothills Average Listing Price: $408,127 Up from $378,1164 last month.

Total Tucson Active Listings: 6,269 Down 5.06% from 6,603 in April of 2010.
Northwest Tucson Active Listings: 1,614 Down 103 units from last month.
Catalina Foothills Active Listings: 620, Down 59 units from last month.

Total Tucson New Listings: 1,396, Down 840 units from 2,236 in April of 2010.
Northwest Tucson New Listings: 352, Down 40 units from last month.
Catalina Foothills New Listings: 121, Down 6 units from last month.

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

Positive Market Indicators this month: Sales activity remains steady, Average Sales Price UP 4.81% over last month, Units under Contract up almost 66% over same period last year (this in an indication that sales are taking longer to close). Even though it takes longer to close now, there are still a lot of sales occurring. New listings down 840 units (37%) from same period last year & Active Listings down 5% from last year.

Negative Market Indicators this month: Average Sales Prices still creeping lower & Interest rates are increasing. We are at the tail end of our prime spring selling season and activity is expected to slow down.

Market Outlook: We expect May & June to probably be ok but expect the market to slow considerably in July, August & September.

Low Ball Offers: There's deals out there, that's for sure, but there's not blood in the streets by any means. The average sales price city wide this period was 94.49% of asking price. Sellers are not going to give their homes away & most are getting really tired of all these low ball offers. We are seeing many sellers just outright rejecting such offers.

Do low ball offers work? Well yes, they sometimes do. But buyers who wish to pursue this strategy must be prepared to have several rejected offers before finally getting one accepted. And the homes that will typically accept low ball offers are often the less desirable homes, (probably not the ones you fell in love with when you were out there looking). If it's a highly desirable home, or if it's new on the market, forget about low ball offers, those sellers still believe they will get close to asking and if it's a nice home, they probably will.

Make reasonable offers and you'll have better luck & probably get the home you really love. Offers of 20% - 30% off list price are just aren't going to fly. All those low ball offers do is insult the sellers and make them harder to work with.

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
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