Earlier this year I reported that the majority of buyers were choosing lower priced homes and there was little demand for higher priced homes.
Even with the daily bad economic news, people still bought homes last year. But, buyers concerned about the economy clearly made conservative spending choices. Homes appropriate for first time buyers and investors made up a big portion of the sales in 2008.
Take a look below to see the differences in 2008 single family home sales for the 3 major counties that make up the St. Louis region. The charts below include closed residential sales in 2008 that were listed in the MLS. The data is obtained through MARIS and deemed reliable but not guaranteed.
Now compare those charts to the ones that were posts at the end of the 1st half of 2008. Even though the news got much worse when the banking crisis hit, the overall trends didn’t change much.
Year End Summary:
There isn’t much of a demand in any of the counties for high priced homes, but 2008 sellers with homes priced over $300,000 had better odds at finding a buyer in St. Louis County than either the City or St. Charles.
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St. Louis City:
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54% of homes sold for under $100,000
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86% of sales were priced under $200,000
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95% were priced under $300,000
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St. Louis County:
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almost equal number of homes sold under $100,000 and between $100,000 – $200,000 (33% & 31%)
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another 16% of homes sold from $200,000 – $300,000
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80% of the homes sold under $300,000
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St. Charles County:
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4% of sales were under $100,000 (dramatically lower than both other counties)
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52% of homes sold between $100,000 – $200,000 and another 30% sold between $200,000 – $300,000
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86% of the homes sold under $300,000
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Click here to see how these percentages compared with those from the first half of the year (none of the percentages changed more than 1%).
What does all this mean?
If you are trying to sell a home and it is priced above or below the average sale prices for your county, there just aren’t a lot of buyers. You need to consider pricing your home aggressively if you hope to get it sold. If you don’t need to move, it might be smarter to stay put for a year or two until sales pick up in your price range.
If you are trying to buy a home, don’t be surprised if you end up competing with other buyers if you are looking at the same price range as the majority of buyers. If you are in a position to purchase a higher priced home, you should be able to find a great deal.
Check back for Part 2 & 3 of this series covering 2008 condo sale prices, how long it took for properties to sell and the percentage sellers came down from their original list price.
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PDF Possibly Related Posts:
- St. Louis Region Housing Market Report – 2009 Home Sales
- St. Louis Region Market Report 2008 – Condo Sales
- St. Louis Region Market Report: January – June 2008 (Part 2)
- St. Louis Region Market Report: January – June 2008 (Part 1)
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{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Karen,
Yours is the first site I have viewed in St Louis Market. I have been studying and trying to understand technically what is going on it regional markets. Am I right in saying that your sales is about steady year over year? If they are, have they move down dramatically over the past couple of years?
What I have found is areas like Southern California and Nevada, Florida, Arizona which have decline significantly have pick uop in sales.
Has your area followed that mold or has it decline more modestly, less than 20% and is holding a bit steady. The heavy decline areas seem to have home prices off 40-60% in some areas.
If real estate is basing your area should help in telling it. Mortgages are getting more available which should give your market a lift, as others.
Richard
Richard,
St. Louis region never had skyrocketing appreciation during the boom years, and as a result, we haven’t crashed as hard. Prices in most areas of the region peaked in 2005. People that bought in 2006 and early 2007 typically paid more than homes are now worth. Prices are back down to 2005 prices in most cases and are holding pretty steady.
In the last year, I’ve had a number of clients that bought between 2001-2003 and sold for more than they purchased.
Of course, there are exceptions. There are subdivisions that continue to have slight appreciation, and others that are much more impacted by the housing downturn. Some of the hardest hit areas were ones that there was a lot of speculators (rehabbers and buyers that were encouraged to purchase with 100% the most expensive newly rehabbed house in the area).
Condos are having a much harder time as is new construction compared to resale homes. See my condo report and my monthly market reports (via tab in the navigation bar).