Market Watch: February 2007

Type	New Listings	Pendings	Listings/Sales Ratio
Single Family Homes	1029	284	3.6 to 1
Condos	336	121	2.8 to 1
Multi-Family	33	7	4.7 to 1

San Diego

Type	New Listings	Pendings	New Listings/Sales Ratio
Downtown Condos (92101)	154	59	2.6 to 1

The Good News for this month is that the ratio of new inventory coming on the market for every property going into escrow declined in all areas. Inventory is still increasing but the rate of increase to be slowing down.

A rising inventory means buyers have more product to choose from, thus creating a buyers market. Declining inventory creates a sellers market and rapid price increases like the market was in 2004/2005.

Desert Realtors as well as some Escrow Company’s are advising the market is making a come back. I think it is way too early to see any definitive trend – we need to have at least six months of positive real estate data.

I recently read a statistic that the #1 indicator of price stability was the proximity of property to the water. That’s good news for Southern California in general. True, we are having some price declines of 0 to 4.6% but this is based on the “median” home price and should be used only as one of many trends to follow.

I noted this month the largest price declines of real property was in the Midwest – an area that has the lowest priced homes anywhere!

All comments are welcomed. Happy St Paddy’s Day.