The story of the day is still low supply driving big competition. Our agents are still seeing multiple offers, but the pace is going from fast to super-sonic, with more offers coming in on homes than even a month ago, and on different types of sales. It’s never been uncommon to see banks price their foreclosures aggressively to start bidding wars, but it’s far less common for a traditional home sale. That’s changing. One of our agents Sara Masey just represented a buyer who placed an offer on a home that received 11 offers in four days…and it was a standard sale.
But let’s take a look at what’s driving that bid-happy behavior…
Inventory Still Freefalling in San Diego
San Diego took another inventory hit in February, down 13.7% since January, and down 45.1% from February 2011. A big portion of the decline was in condos, where the number of condos on the market dropped by 55.4% year over year to 875. It was the first time in the past year that the number of condos on the market was less than 1,000.
Months of supply, an industry term for the time it would take to sell through the current supply of homes on the market, given the current rate of sales, was 2.7 months, a 12-month low for San Diego. In a market balance between buyers and sellers, you’d expect to see 5-6 months, so it’s definitely still a seller’s market here.
Where’s the Inventory?
Some cities in San Diego County are feeling the inventory shortage a lot harder than others. Here’s a list of all the cities in the county with 100 or more homes for sale, sorted by the year over year declines they’ve experienced.
Prices Recovering from Seasonal Lows
The median price of a single-family home in San Diego was up 4.1% month over month and 2.7% year over year, at $385,000. That’s the highest it’s been since October, when the median price was $390,000. Condo prices, however, reached a 12-month low of $184,000.
