Well, not quite. But it isn’t 2008 either. In the last quarter my team has put together 42 contracts for sale for both our buyer and seller clients across the DC Metro area and approximately 70% had multiple bids. Clearly not a scientific study, but fantastic on the ground data. So what’s going on? Ignore the national numbers for a moment which said home sales are down more than 2% this month, and focus on the local stats. For this blog I’m going to focus on DC Houses. More stats by the way can be found at http://gcaar.com/toolkit_ektid868.aspx .
In comparison to August 2008 listings – or new homes on the market – are down 15.2% - or 255 less homes to potentially buy. New ratified contracts are up 17.7% - or in other words 373 more buyers and sellers agreed upon a price in August 09 than they did in August 08. The reason is clear – prices are down in most areas to a level that has again sparked the buyer’s interest. The average price of a house in DC in August 2008 was $628,170 and in August 2009 it was $564,474. If you saw a reduction of $63,696 wouldn’t you also take a closer look at the house?
I did a recent interview on DC Fox 5 that sums it up. Take a look: http://www.myfoxdc.com/dpp/news/local/092409_dc_area_homes_bidding_wars