Saskatoon real estate week in review: December 20-23 2010

After a few years of showing up for work during the last half of December one begins to learn that you generally can’t expect much in the way of an immediate return. For the most part, people are focused on other things and hunting for a home takes a back burner for all but the most motivated. Yet, we (TeamFisher) are pleasantly surprised to find ourselves strangely busy for late December with almost 2 million dollars in sales in the last ten days. Lyndon sold one yesterday and Pamela put one to bed just today, Christmas Eve. We’ll gladly take them as the next two weeks typically just get slower. It’s doubtful that more than fifty or sixty homes will move during that time. Still, it can be an exciting time for a real estate agent as these next two weeks bring us to the bottom of our annual unit sales cycle. Generally, we can expect gradual but steady improvement in the four or five months that follow. Spring is on its way and I am feeling optimistic for a good strong year.

This week’s sales moved in the expected downward direction but held up pretty well compared to most years. Saskatoon real estate agents reported thirty-seven firm sales to the multiple listing service®, a drop of just four from last week, but enough to beat sales for the same week last yearby seven homes.

While you can occasionally be surprised by stronger than expected sales activity around the holiday season you can almost place your bets on weakening listing activity. New listingsfell this week, dropping to just twenty-eight houses and condos, down from fifty-three last week, but still well ahead of the same week last year when just fifteen Saskatoon homes came on the market.

Click the image for a larger version of the graph.

The inventory of active residential listings on the multiple listing service® continued its slide dropping fifty-five homes compared to last week to settle at 922 by this morning, up just under two hundred units from the same week a year ago. The declines were spread nearly evenly across houses and condos. This morning, there are 506 active single-family home listings and 363 condominiums, down thirty-eight and thirty-two respectively from a week ago. 139 properties are scheduled to expire between now and January 1 so its entirely possible that inventory will bottom out somewhere below 800 units before it begins to build up as spring approaches.

Click the image for a larger version of the graph.

Just seventeen MLS® listings were cancelled or withdrawn this week. Most of those frustrated sellers appear to be serious about coming off the market, at least for now, as only five did an about face and immediately relisted. Price adjustments were even softer with just seven sellers changing their price. I suppose if you’re going to cancel and relist, or adjust your price, you may as well do it when more people are paying attention.

This week saw a fair share of activity at the lower half of the market and the median selling price of a Saskatoon home slipped eight thousand dollars lower to $277,000. A single sale above the one million dollar mark skewed the average selling price higher than it otherwise would have been. Still, that price measure managed to slide thirty-seven hundred dollars from last week to $318,035. The six-week average also slipped by just under a thousand dollars to $311,020 for a year-over-year gain of almost twenty-four thousand dollars. The four-week median fell eight thousand dollars from last week to $289,000 and finished ahead of the same week last year by just five thousand dollars. That’s the slimmest year-over-year gain since late August.

Click the image for a larger version of the graph.

Thirty-two of thirty-seven sales went below the asking price by $14,690, or about 4.35% of the asking price. This is a significantly higher average underbid than we’re accustomed to seeing. One of the homes sold this week went $150K below the asking price, essentially skewing the average dollar discount by more than four thousand dollars. Without it, we’d have been closer to the 10K-ish, 3-3.5% discount. Additionally, there were three sales reported at a price greater than the asking price, by an average of $3500. Another two sellers got their price.

Click the image for a larger version of the chart.

Have a great holiday everyone!

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Norm Fisher
Royal LePage Vidorra