Interest rates continue to drive further recovery to our local real estate market here in south Orange County. While they had been up slightly for a short time over the last few weeks, they are still touching historical record lows and that is keeping the steady stream of buyers lining up to make offers for the relatively few properties available here in South County. If your home is priced right for this current market, sellers are seeing prices driven up by multiple offers and being able to pick from a nice pool of buyers that range from first time buyers, investors (many of which are all cash), those looking to trade up and those trading down.
From offers I have written that stretch from LA to San Diego, there have been very few that hit the owners tables all alone. In some cases there have been eight, fifteen, twenty and one where there was thirty plus! A very unique aspect that comes from this newly reinvigorated sellers market is that you need to have your buyers positioned to make an offer that stands tall among all the others. For our sellers, it is a welcome change and one reminiscent of the middle part of the last decade.
In looking at an updated chart from our last July post, you can see that the sales numbers bear out evidence of this continued recovery, while the numbers are not even close to the crazy run up that prompted this twisted real estate and economic malaise, that is actually a good thing.
While the southernmost coastal cities (Laguna Beach, Dana Point & San Clemente) have posted higher total sold numbers, the average sold price figures, YTD 2012 compared to all of 2011 tell a mixed story. Laguna Beach and San Clemente have both posted solid gains, Laguna Beach sits at 6.8% when compared to prices last year and San Clemente has solid gains showing a healthy 5%+. Dana Point, while posting in increase in total sales overall has continued to drop, sitting around a 7.8% drop in prices.
As expected, this "Recovery" has been all over the news, both local and national, over the past few months. Many wonder what the future holds, can this run continue, through a presidential election, the economic and political instability in Europe and points further east? Only time will tell but if I had to throw down some money, my bet is on slow and steady. One of the most positive aspects of our current real estate market is that there is some benefit for both sides, sellers and buyers. On the sell side, you have your choice of buyers, they are lining up, offers on hand, most of them are even reasonable. For buyers, the deals are still out there and the rates, well, these are as good as they have ever been.
Jump in, its time, no matter what side you are on, its win-win (for now). The Fed can only hold rates down for so long (right, wrong, artificially too low, whatever, there is no wrong answer) and when the rates turn, it will have a much bigger impact on the market than any other of the metrics.
For additional info relating to MLS statistics, data and real time MLS home searches, visit http://BuySouthOChomes.com
