September City/Neighborhood Price Reductions

It’s been a while since we had a look at which cities and towns have the most price reductions.

The following charts show the percent of MLS, FSBO or REO listings that were price-reduced at some point before leaving the market (either sold or removed unsold from the market) in the past 90 days. Cities/towns or neighborhoods in which the number of homes taken off the market was too small to provide believable estimates are excluded from ranking.

For those that are interested, I have uploaded the full data set in Excel format here. The downloadable Excel file also includes charts showing the top ten cities/towns/neighborhoods with the least reduced-price listings.

First up are the top ten cities with the most price-reduced listings:

Of the 125 cities/towns we ranked in the Chicago area this month, 76 had price-reduced ratios of fifty percent or more. The median price-reduced ratio was 52.0%.

Getting a little more granular, let’s look at the top ten neighborhoods for price reductions:

Of the 93 neighborhoods we ranked this month, 39 had a price-reduced ratio of fifty percent or more. The median price-reduced ratio was 48.0%.

Download the full spreadsheet to check where your neighborhood came in.

June City/Neighborhood Price Reductions

Let’s take our monthly look at which cities and towns have the most price reductions.

The following charts show the percent of MLS, FSBO or REO listings that were price-reduced at some point before leaving the market (either sold or removed unsold from the market) in the past 90 days. Cities/towns or neighborhoods in which the number of homes taken off the market was too small to provide believable estimates are excluded from ranking.

For those that are interested, I have uploaded the full data set in Excel format here. The downloadable Excel file also includes charts showing the top ten cities/towns/neighborhoods with the least reduced-price listings.

First up are the top ten cities with the most price-reduced listings:

Of the 229 cities/towns we ranked in the Chicago area this month, 102 had price-reduced ratios of fifty percent or more.

Getting a little more granular, let’s look at the top ten Chicago area neighborhoods for price reductions:

Of the 161 neighborhoods we ranked in the Chicago area this month, 48 had a price-reduced ratio of fifty percent or more. Unlike many other markets Redfin serves, there was no apparent correlation between prices and number of price reductions in a neighborhood.

The general trend in Chicago looks to be more or less holding steady with the number of price reductions, however every city and neighborhood is of course different. Some may be getting softer while others get tighter. Download the full spreadsheet to check where your neighborhood came in.

March City/Neighborhood Price Reductions

Let’s take our monthly look at which cities and towns have the most price reductions.

The following charts show the percent of MLS, FSBO or REO listings that were price-reduced at some point before leaving the market (either sold or removed unsold from the market) in the past 90 days. Cities/towns or neighborhoods in which the number of homes taken off the market was too small to provide believable estimates are excluded from ranking.

For those that are interested, I have uploaded the full data set in Excel format here. The downloadable Excel file also includes charts showing the top ten cities/towns/neighborhoods with the least reduced-price listings.

First up are the top ten cities with the most price-reduced listings:

Of the 229 cities/towns we ranked in the Chicago area this month, 125 (55%) had price-reduced ratios of fifty percent or more. The top four cities this month all carried over from last month, although not in the same order. Last month’s #1 Olympia Fields dropped to #2, with Boulder Hill moving from #9 last month to #1 this month.

Getting a little more granular, let’s look at the top ten Chicago area neighborhoods for price reductions:

Of the 100 neighborhoods we ranked in the Chicago area this month, 27 (27%) had a price-reduced ratio of fifty percent or more. West Rockford, North Park, North Center, and East Side Aurora all carried over from last month. These are the neighborhoods where you might want to look for sellers that are more anxious to sell.

We’re still seeing a degree of consistency in which neighborhoods and cities have the most price reductions. Are sellers in these locations just not very good at finding the right market price in the first place, or are they so anxious to sell that they drop the price early and often? Either way, the regions with the really high percentage of reduced-price homes are probably a good place to go bargain-hunting.

February City/Neighborhood Price Reductions

Let’s take our monthly look at which cities and towns have the most price reductions.

The following charts show the percent of MLS, FSBO or REO listings that were price-reduced at some point before leaving the market (either sold or removed unsold from the market) in the past 90 days. Cities/towns or neighborhoods in which the number of homes taken off the market was too small to provide believable estimates are excluded from ranking.

For those that are interested, I have uploaded the full data set in Excel format here. The downloadable Excel file also includes charts showing the top ten cities/towns/neighborhoods with the least reduced-price listings.

First up are the top ten cities with the most price-reduced listings:

Of the 229 cities/towns we ranked in the Chicago area this month, 131 (57%) had price-reduced ratios of fifty percent or more. Only Huntley carried over from last month’s top ten to this month.

Getting a little more granular, let’s look at the top ten Chicago area neighborhoods for price reductions:

Of the 101 neighborhoods we ranked in Chicago area this month, only 23 (23%) had a price-reduced ratio of fifty percent or more. On the neighborhood level, slightly more of the top ten list remained the same, with West Side, Old Town, Roscoe Village, and East Side Aurora all continuing to rank highly.

At the neighborhood level, there is definitely some consistency in the number of homes seeing price reductions. If finding a good deal on a home is important to you, these neighborhoods might be a good place to start, as higher ratios of reduced-price homes indicate sellers that need to sell and are willing to lower the price to do so.

January City/Neighborhood Price Reductions

Let’s take our monthly look at which cities and towns have the most price reductions.

The following charts show the percent of MLS, FSBO or REO listings that were price-reduced at some point before leaving the market (either sold or removed unsold from the market) in the past 90 days. Cities/towns or neighborhoods in which the number of homes taken off the market was too small to provide believable estimates are excluded from ranking.

For those that are interested, I have uploaded the full data set in Excel format here (saved in Excel 97-2003 .xls format by request). In order to keep from overwhelming you with charts, I am leaving out the top ten cities/towns/neighborhoods with the least reduced-price listings from the post, but you can still see that chart in the downloaded file.

First up are the top ten cities with the most price-reduced listings:

Of the 242 cities/towns we ranked in the Chicago Area this month, 110 had price-reduced ratios of fifty percent or more. Orland Hills slipped from the #1 spot last month to #2 this month, with last month’s #3 North Barrington jumping up to #1. A total of five cities from last month’s top ten carried into this month.

Getting a little more granular, let’s look at the top ten Chicago Area neighborhoods for price reductions:

Just 17 of the 102 neighborhoods we ranked in the Chicago Area had a price-reduced ratio of fifty percent or more, which is slightly more than last month’s 10. Only four neighborhoods carried over from last month’s top ten. Garfield Ridge, Roscoe Village, Pilsen / Lower West Side, and West Side have all made the top ten for three months in a row.

For home buyers, cities and neighborhoods that consistently remain near the top of the list for price reductions may be a good place to potentially hunt for bargains. Once a home has been on the market a while, many buyers tend to overlook it, even though a price reduction or two may have brought it into a more desirable price range.

City/Town/Neighborhood December Price Reduction Update

Let’s take another look at which cities and towns have the most price reductions.

The following charts show the percent of MLS, FSBO or REO listings that were price-reduced at some point before leaving the market (either sold or removed unsold from the market) in the past 90 days. Cities/towns or neighborhoods in which the number of homes taken off the market was too small to provide believable estimates are excluded from ranking.

For those that are interested, I have uploaded the full data set in Excel format here. In order to keep from overwhelming you with charts, I am leaving out the top ten cities/towns/neighborhoods with the least reduced-price listings from the post, but you can still see that chart in the downloaded file.

First up are the top ten cities with the most price-reduced listings:

Of the 249 cities/towns we ranked in the Chicago area, 78 had price-reduced ratios of fifty percent or more. North Barrington, Warrenville, Winthrop Harbor, Lake Barrington, and Gilberts all made the top ten last month and this month, with a consistently high volume of price reductions.

Getting a little more granular, let’s look at the top ten Chicago area neighborhoods for price reductions:

Only 10 of the 103 neighborhoods we ranked in the Chicago area had a price-reduced ratio of fifty percent or more. Six neighborhoods—Garfield Ridge, Washington Park, Roscoe Village, Pilsen / Lower West Side, Bucktown, and West Side—carried over from last month’s top ten as well.

Unfortunately, there do not appear to be any particularly strong patterns in the data that suggest where to look for sellers that might be more willing to negotiate a lower price. However, there does seem to be some consistency from month to month in the neighborhoods with lots of price reductions, so I recommend that bargain-hunters download the full data set and sift through it for their preferred neighborhoods.

Which Neighborhoods Have the Fastest Price Reductions?

Here’s a fun set of data. Redfin data engineers have dug deep into our market databases to find out which neighborhoods have the fastest price reductions.

For listings with more than one price drop, we calculated the time between each price drop. Then, for each neighborhood, we calculated the median average number of days between successive price drops for listings. Neighborhoods with fewer than 20 reduced-price listings were excluded from the calculation.

Here’s a chart of the top ten neighborhoods with the fastest price reductions:

For those readers that are interested to know which neighborhoods had the slowest price drops, feel free to download the full data set in Excel 2007 format.

None of the neighborhoods with the fastest price reductions made this month’s top ten neighborhoods with the most price-reduced listings. On average, 37% of listings taken off the market in the Chicago neighborhoods with the fastest price reductions had experienced price reductions.

On average, neighborhoods where price reductions happen the fastest in the Chicago area had slighly lower prices both in terms of median price and price per square foot. The average median sold price per square foot of the top ten neighborhoods with the fastest price reductions was $163, while the ten neighborhoods with the slowest price reductions had an average median sold price of $215 per square foot.

Which Cities, Towns, and Neighborhoods have the most price reductions?

Today Redfin is launching the new Sweet Digs, Analytical Edition. We’re proud to introduce Tim Ellis as the curator of this new effort. Tim will bring the same independent, data-driven perspective to Sweet Digs that first established him as a pre-eminent real estate blogger, but with pricing data that only a broker—and sometimes only Redfin—can access. He will be joined by other bloggers providing real-time insights on how contracts are being negotiated in neighborhoods around the area.

Sweet Digs is still a work in progress so if you have ideas about the types of posts you’d like to see — or if you’d like to contribute an analytical post of your own — just drop me (glenn at redfin dot com) or Tim (the_tim at thatchmound dot com) a line or leave a comment below. Thanks for all your support, and we look forward to hearing from you!

Regards, Glenn Kelman, CEO Redfin

I’d like to thank Glenn and the good people at Redfin for giving me the opportunity to delve into real estate data and share insights with readers from around the country. To kick things off, let’s take a look at which cities and towns have the most price reductions.

The following charts show the percent of MLS, FSBO or REO listings that were price-reduced at some point before leaving the market (either sold or removed unsold from the market) in the past 90 days. Cities/towns or neighborhoods in which the number of homes taken off the market was too small to provide believable estimates are excluded from ranking.

First up are the top ten cities with the most price-reduced listings:

Of the 247 cities/towns we ranked in the Chicago area, only these top ten had a price-reduced ratio of fifty percent or more. Straddling I-90 an hour west of Chicago, the small village of Gilberts was the sole town with over sixty percent price-reduced listings.

Here are the top ten cities with the least price-reduced listings:

While no cities in Cook County appeared on the most price-reduced list, Cook makes a strong showing on the least price-reduced list, taking five spots. Interestingly, Poplar Grove, the city with the least amount of price-reduced listings, is even further east of Chicago off I-90 than Gilberts.

Getting a little more granular, let’s look at the top ten Chicago area neighborhoods for price reductions:

Only 3 of the 104 neighborhoods we ranked in Redfin’s Chicago service area had a price-reduced ratio of fifty percent or more. In neighborhoods where homes are coming off the market, the majority of sellers are not reducing their price.

Lastly, let’s take a look at which neighborhoods had the least price-reduced listings taken off the market:

Even further east than the city with least price-reduced listings are the neighborhoods of West Rockford and North Rockford, which bookend the top ten least price-reduced neighborhoods list. With their respective median sold home prices of $32,000 and $82,000, perhaps sellers in West and North Rockford simply don’t have room to drop the price.

In general, the neighborhoods where more sellers are reducing their price tend to be lower-priced (many with median home prices under $250k) than those that are seeing fewer price reductions (which tend to have median prices over $250k).