Sarasota REALTORS® have been quite busy this year, working their weekends and evenings, to accomplish one goal – taking care of their clients. Home buyers understand the local market has been very active and they want to get a great deal while they still can. As a result, potential buyers are putting in offers at a greatly accelerated pace. The Sarasota Association of REALTORS® (SAR) has reported its members have had a total of 1,017 closings for the month of April. We have not seen numbers like these since the month of June 2005! It’s rare these days to see the total number of closings for a single month be above the 1,000 mark. So much so SAR has only seen 10 months perform at this rate during the entire 90 years of its existence. Aside from this month the other nine months to top 1,000 closings took place during 2004 and 2005. Let’s take a look at the April break down.
Obviously April has proven to be an extraordinary month in the Sarasota real estate market with 1,017 closed transactions. Single family homes made up 714 of these closings while condos made up 303, giving us our final four digit number. Taking a look at April’s performance last year, we find that there were 589 closed transactions for single family homes and 297 for condominiums. This brings our final total for the Month of April 2012 to 886 closed transactions. What a difference a year makes! This represents a whopping fourteen percent increase in our market. The numbers so far this year are reassuring for the months to come. Historically we see a decline in closing transactions when approaching the summer months, but it’s my prediction we’re going to continue on this upswing and will see more record breaking numbers.
No Single Factor
The reason for the high sales volume seems to lie with the increased median sales price of properties. When a trend like this develops we find more owners are willing to sell their homes, as they believe they will be receiving better compensation for their property. We also see the buyers are taking less time to put in a written offer to avoid a multiple offer situation, or worse yet, to prevent losing the property due to another offer being submitted. Taking a look at the numbers we see April’s median sales price for single family homes is $217,000 (its highest level since August 2008) with condos not looking as promising at $185,000. The median April 2012 price for a single family home was $175,000, which makes this April’s price a 24% increase over last year! Condos are a different story, with last year’s sales price being $191,000. However, April’s condo price is certainly a vast improvement over the January 2013 price of $130,000.
This positive upswing in sales activity has not gone unnoticed. Recently Roger Piro, President of the Sarasota Sarasota homes values are also on the rise.Association of REALTORS® said, “This historic number of sales is a testimony to the hard working professional REALTORS® who belong to this association. Many agents and brokers I talk with are spending countless hours with buyers and sellers, working nights and weekends and going that extra mile to make sure they meet the needs of their clients. This has been an amazing time for the Sarasota real estate market, and it’s our members who help make dreams come true for those who want to make Sarasota their new home.”
The future is starting to look even brighter. If we examine pending sales for the year, it’s amazing to see that Sarasota REALTORS® have hit the quadruple digits every month so far in 2013! Pending sales predict future closings and are an important statistic that represents properties that went under contract before seeing the closing table. Taking a look at our pending sales numbers, April had a total of 1,097, slightly below last month’s figure of 1,221, but still higher than last April’s figure of 1,068. If we keep going at this rate, we should see more four digit months.
The Promise of Tomorrow
Another piece of good news in today’s market is the fact the number of short sales and foreclosures are on a steady decline. Currently there are only 376 properties listed on the Multiple Listing System® (also known as the MLS®) as financially distressed. This is 22 fewer than last month’s figure, and represent 10.8% of today’s listed properties. Back in January this figure was an astounding 17%. But even that harsh figure is minor compared to the 4th quarter of 2010 when properties of this type represented 51% of listings on the MLS®! We must ensure we don’t reach a point again where lenders allow unqualified buyers to purchase outside of their means, and make certain these individuals 2013 promises to be a good year for real estate.are able to find a house they can truly afford.
All in all, REALTORS® participating in today’s active market are enthralled by what the times and economy are bringing to them. We are seeing the sales numbers skyrocket, a more promising median sales price for single family homes and fewer financially distressed properties. I believe this trend will continue and anticipate more positive events, and additional good news as the year progresses. We are on the right track to continue to improve our situation from the fiscal nightmare we saw back in 2006. Ultimately, we are moving onward and upward with our healthy active market. The future looks bright, and Sarasota will benefit from this renewed sense of optimism and hope.
Would you like to learn more about the current real estate market in Sarasota? Are you interested in learning the potential sales value of your home? Then please do not hesitate to Contact us at 941.284.4474 or Toll free 941.404.4737. One of our qualified Sarasota agents will be glad to get back to you.