This may be a preliminary look, but there won’t be many more late reporters.  Agents are supposed to mark their sales closed within 48 hours, and we’re a week out.  But even considering the typical end-of-summer slowdown, it looks like sales are plunging.

Today, the MLS shows a paltry 234 detached-home sales last month, the lowest August total of the last four years:

Year
# of Sales
Median SP
Avg. $-per-sf
Avg. DOM
Aug ’09
215
$825,000
$373/sf
83
Aug ’10
210
$838,000
$389/sf
63
Aug ’11
240
$825,000
$389/sf
80
Aug ’12
298
$865,000
$381/sf
84
Aug ’13
324
$953,750
$437/sf
40
Jul ’14
268
$1,050,000
$490/sf
45
Aug ’14
234
$1,011,500
$450/sf
46

While we enjoyed some frenzy-like months during the 2014 selling season, it looks like we’re heading back to the far-more mundane pace of 3-5 years ago.

graph (50)

For sellers who tacked on an extra 5% to 10% to your list price:  If it doesn’t work, at least adjust downward fast enough that the urgency stays higher, and you beat the holidays – Halloween is only seven weeks away!

 

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