The NYT has another article lamenting the drop in the number of homes for sale, and offered some reasons, like covid reluctance, sellers skittish about finding their next home, forbearance relief, the lack of building new homes, and people keeping their old home as an investment property when they buy a new one.

But who cares about inventory when we’re having MORE SALES THAN EVER.

It’s true that the number of new listings this year is about 23% behind where it was last year at this time.

The other day I compared just to 2020, but here’s a look at the last ten years:

NSDCC Closed Sales Jan 1 – Feb 15

Year
# of Sales
Median Sales Price
2011
158
$810,500
2012
153
$749,000
2013
197
$845,000
2014
261
$1,007,500
2015
252
$1,200,000
2016
253
$1,125,000
2017
260
$1,200,000
2018
231
$1,300,000
2019
242
$1,288,000
2020
254
$1,394,775
2021
299
$1,695,000
% Change, YoY
+18%
+22%

We haven’t had this big of a jump in number of sales AND median sales price to start the year since the Frenzy of 2013 bled into early 2014 when we had a 32% increase in sales and +19% in median sales price. Back in 2004, we had a 26% increase in the median sales price (from $635,000 to $799,000), but the number of sales dropped from 253 to 209.

This is the new reality – more people chasing fewer homes for sale.

Buyers who might think we’re going to get a pullback because rates have gone up are going to get a good lesson on who’s in charge here. Sellers don’t care about rate hikes, lack of inventory, or your lease expiring. They just want their money, and if they don’t get it today, they will wait until they do.

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Jim the Realtor
Jim is a long-time local realtor who comments daily here on his blog, bubbleinfo.com which began in September, 2005. Stick around!

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