Mr Williamsburg, Revolutionary ideas on real estate!Hampton Roads Virginia

Let me start by  saying statistics for this summary are derived from the Real Estate Information Network, REIN, An MLS that primarily covers the areas of Southside Hampton Roads, the Peninsula region as well as a few other outlying areas . There is another MLS in Williamsburg (WAAR) and another in Gloucester (CBRAR) and one in Richmond (CVRMLS)  There will be differences in outlying area results since not all homes are listed and sold in each of the MLS’s 

The Hampton Roads residential real estate market continues showing signs of stabilizing and strengthening. The number of residential settled sales and under contract sales maintained positive trends while the number of active listings for sale slowed its climb. It does seem that not everything is settling down as the distressed homes market continued to increase.

February 2011 saw solid gains in the number of residential settled sales, up 9% when compared to February 2010. However, the Hampton Roads market seems to be bifurcated between the Southside region and the Peninsula when it comes to settled sales last month. The Southside region saw an increase of 16% year-over-year while the Peninsula was down 8.5% for the month. All of the major cities in the Southside area showed year-over-year monthly gains in the number of settled sales. Only James City County experienced significant growth in the Peninsula region, up 11.5% when compared to February last year.

The rise in the number of homes was dampened by the 6.6% drop in the median sales price of settled sales in February on a year-over-year basis. The Peninsula experienced larger median settled sales price declines, down 9.6%, than the Southside, down 6.5% last month. However, not every area is experiencing price declines, as James City County and York County both showed strong median price year-over-year growth with gains of 4.5% and 18.8% respectively. ( see my note above, this also can be attributed to more sales of large more expensive homes)The year-to-date median sales price is now lower 5.6% over the first two months of 2011 when compared to the same time period last year.

Active residential listings for sale grew again on a year-over-year basis to 14,170. This increase represents a 1.6% rise over the same time last year. The pace additional units for sale are coming on to the market seems to be easing. This slowing of new units being added to the ranks of those for sale bodes well for the market as a whole, as too much inventory would contribute to the already elevated months’ supply of inventory, which currently stands at 9.86 months (six to eight months is considered normal.) As the supply decreases, the prices should stabilize and the market will return to normal seasonal trends.

The one area of the residential market that continues to show weakness is the distressed homes sector. The number of distressed homes, those that are bank owned or short sales, that settled in February 2011 climbed for the third month in a row to 42% of resale residential settled sales. This is the largest percentage for a single month since the tracking of distressed sales began. The percentage has climbed steadily starting in 2008 and has doubled from 21% in May 2010 to the current 42%.

For the month of February, distressed homes comprised 23% of the number of active resale residential listings for sale. This was the second month in a row the percentage of active listings distressed homes declined, down from the 24.9% seen in December 2010 and 24.5% in January 2011. The signs that distressed homes are declining as a percentage of active homes for sale while they increase as a percentage of settled sales could point to a clearing of the distressed market. This will only hold true if there is not a glut of distressed homes poised to enter the market that is currently being held as a “shadow inventory” by banks and other entities. If the end of distressed inventory is near, then home prices in the region should see the stability of a bottom coincide.

Filed under: Foreclosures, hampton roads, Selling a home in Hampton Roads VA |