Blacksburg Stats are Looking Good
Everyone is talking about how bad the national housing stats are, but that's just it - national. Here in the NRV, we have our own unique economy that doesn't feel the shocking jolts as much as the rest of the country as a whole. The national unemployment rate may be 10%, but the state of Virginia only has a 6.5%. That really isn't that bad, especially because an accepted normal/low unemployment rate is 3.5%.
I generated the graphs below from our local mls.
The Average Amount of Days on the Market Until Properties were Sold in Blacksburg.
 |
| This graph is of the average days on the market a house sits before it sells. It is from July 2006 through July 2010. The blue line shows the % of the asking price that the home sold for. I want you to notice a couple key things from this graph. First, the Sold Price to Asking Price ration (blue line) has stayed pretty stable. That's good. Another thing to point out is starting in March 2009, the time that a house sat on the market sharply increased. That means there were tons of homes for sale, and not enough buyers, so the homes were just sitting there. This increased more, and eventually decreased in March this year. It continued to decrease through last month. If you look at last month, July, and compare it to July 2006, they look pretty similar, eh? We went through a rough patch, but it looks like the sun is shining through the clouds. |
 |
| Now, what I want you to see is the middle column labeled "1 year". Look at the increase, yes - increase, in the Average Sold Price of Single Family Homes. Granted it is still lower than 4 years prior, but it just shows up that the bottom of the market has passed & we are on the upswing! Also, if you look at the green line on the graph, it is telling you the Average Asking Price of Homes on the market at that time. I notice the gradual decrease in asking price, which is good because sellers are making more informed, yet sometimes hard, decisions regarding the price of their home. Let's analyze this graph, as it applies to real life choices, from a completely objective point of view. The red line tells us the average price point people are willing to spend on homes. The green line is the asking price, which is clearly above the red line. If we want to sell our home, we have to be in the right price pool. Where the green line meets the red line will be the market equilibrium, and at that point, everybody will be happy. Which will pull harder, the green or red? We shall see.... |
