2011 Tallahassee Real Estate Market Update Part 1

Today I will be giving you an update on the current condition of Tallahassee's real estate market. Once again I have taken the liberty of doing some research, and using the Tallahassee Board of Realtors MLS statistics, I have pulled and analyzed some very useful data that I will be using here today to give you an idea of how Tallahassee's residential real estate market is doing. In my research I made year to year comparisons covering and comparing the time periods of January 1st 2010-April 30th 2010 to January 1st 2011-April 30th 2011. To make my data as meaningful as possible, I divided propeties by both price range and location. I divided the properties up into 5 different price ranges and 4 different areas of town. In my research I looked up the number of homes listed during those time periods, the number of homes sold in those time periods, the average sale price of the homes that sold in those time periods, the average number of days it took for a home to sell in those time periods, and the sale price to list price ratio (this is the average % of what a home sold for compared to what it was listed for sale at). I pulled all this data for all properties in each price range and each area of town. Below is a summary of the data that I found categorized by price range and for Tallahassee as a whole.


YEAR OVER YEAR MARKET STATISTICS FOR TALLAHASSEE AS A WHOLE


26.6% decrease in number of homes listed for sale (2,233 homes listed)

5.5% increase in number of homes sold (955 homes sold)

9.7% decrease in average sale price of a home ($153,743)

2.26% decrease in sale to list price ratio (93.33%)

17 day increase in the average amount of time it takes to sell a home (158 days)

Overall, the Tallahassee real estate market appears to be headed in the right direction toward recovery, but it is clear that we have not hit the bottom. The amount of properties listed for sale has sharply decreased in the last year, and at the same time we have experienced an overall increase in sales. This is clearly a good sign. A decrease in our housing inventory and the increase in sales is exactly what we need to happen in order for home prices to stabilize and begin to increase again. This is basic economics. You decrease supply and increase demand, and eventually prices will rise. However, we still are not quite at that point where the change of supply and demand has been dramitic enough for prices to stablilize yet. The over supply of homes coupled with the downward pressure on prices from foreclosures and short sales has caused prices to continue to fall.


In addition to this, the overall sale to list price ratio has dropped by 2.36% over the past year. The sale to list price ratio is what the average house sells at compared to what it was listed for sale at. For instance, if a house is listed for sale at $100,000 and it sells for $95,000, the sale to list price ratio for that home is 95%. A high sale to list price ratio is a sign of a strong and healthy real estate market (a seller's market). A low sale to list price ratio is a sign of a weak real estate market (a buyer's market).


Finally, it appears that the average amount of days that it took to sell a house that sold in this time period increased in from last year. Typically, the longer the average time period it takes to sell a home, the weaker the housing market.


As you will see from the specific statistics on our local housing market below, in certain price ranges in certain areas of town, prices are actually stabilizing or even increasing slightly, so it's not all bad news. Most of the decrease in our housing market is occuring in the lower priced properties and in the highest priced properties. The market for mid-range priced homes, especially in northeast Tallahassee, seems to be a more stable and healthy than the Tallahassee real estate market as a whole.



The $0-$125,000 Price Range.


Northeast Tallahassee


9.1% increase in the number of houses listed for sale

12% decreases in the number of homes sold.

2.8% decrease in the average sale price

45 day increase in average time it took to sell a home (155 days)

5.92 % decrease in the average sale price to list price ratio (90.2%)

Northwest Tallahassee (The college side of town)



29.3% decrease in the number of properties listed for sale

7.5% increase in the number of properties sold

18.6% decrease in the average sale price

2.3% decrease in the average sale price to list price ratio (93.8%)

14 day increase in the average amount of time it took for property to sell (151 days)

Southeast Tallahassee



16.1% decrease in the amount of properties listed for sale

62.7% increase in the number of properties sold

20.4% decrease in the average sales price

2.3% decrease in the average sale price to list price ratio (91.52%)

27 day increase in the average amount of days it took for a property to sell (129 days)

Southwest Tallahassee



4.7% decrease in the amount of properties listed for sale.

97% increase in the amount of properties sold

24.2% decrease in the average sales price

6.15% decrease in the average sale price to list price ratio (87.35%)

76 day increase in the average amount of days it took for a property to sell (165 days)

Summary of the $0-$125,000 price range


Overall in the price range, the number of properties listed for sale decreased dramatically, and the number of properties sold has increased dramatically. The increase in sales has seemed to be caused by the steep decrease in the average sales price of homes in this price range. Home prices have faced extreme downward pressure from the abundance of distressed sales in this price range. The average amount of days it took to sell a home in this price range increased and the average sale price to list price ratio has decreased which indicates that this price range is becoming more of a buyer's market.


The area of town that was the exception to the general trend for this price range was the northeast part of Tallahassee. The market in the northeast seemed to be much more stable with prices not dropping as much as in other areas of town. Also, sales went down and the number of properties listed for sale went up as well which are both the opposite of what happenend on all other three areas of Tallahassee.



The $125,001-$250,000 price range.


Northeast Tallahassee


17.9% decrease in the number of properties listed for sale

5.35% decrease in the number of properties sold

1.1% increase in the average sales price

.3% increase in the average sale price/list price ratio (96.29%)

10 day decrease in the average number of days in took a home to sell (139 days)

Northwest Tallahassee


48.7% decrease in the number of properties listed for sale

45.2% decrease in the number of properties sold

2.9% increase in the average sales price

.44% decrease in the average sale price to list price ratio (96.84%)

15 day increase in the average amount of days it took a home to sell (156 days)

Southeast Tallahassee

43.6% decrease in the number of properties listed for sale

30.7% decrease in the number of properties sold

2.5% increase in the average sales price

1.43% decrease in the average sale price to list price ratio (96.06%)

7 day decrease in the average days in took to sell a home (121 days)

Southwest Tallahassee


62% decrease in the number of properties listed for sale

69% decrease in the number of properties sold

1.67% decrease in the average sales price

.62% decrease in the average sale price to list price ratio. (98.73%)

302 day increase in the average amount of time it took to sell a home (405 days)

Summary of the $125,001-$250,000 price range


Overall this price range of homes was marked by price stability. Prices increased very slightly in the northeast, northwest, and southeast parts of Tallahassee while decreasing slightly in the southwest part of Tallahassee. In this price range, both the number of properties listed for sale and the number of properties sold decreased pretty sharply which indicates that there was an overall decrease in buying and selling activity in this price range.

With the exception of the southwest part of Tallahassee, the average days it took to sell a property in this price range went down. This probably has to do with the fact that the amount of homes to choose from in this price range that are for sale has decreased.

The average sale price to list price ratio alse decreased very slightly in the price range which means that overall the market for homes in this price range has very slightly shifted to more of a buyer's market


The $250,001-$450,000 price range


Northeast Tallahassee


16.78% decrease in the number of properties listed for sale

30.7% decrease in the number of properties sold

3.5% increase in the average sales price

.38% increase in the average sale price to list price ratio (96.19%)

18 day increase in the average number of days it took for a property to sell. (151 days)

Northwest Tallahassee


29.2% decrease in the number of properties listed for sale

60% increase in the number of properties sold

.6% increase in the average sales price

4.08% increase in the average sale price to list price ratio

74 day increase in the average number of days it took to sell a property. (203 days)

Southeast Tallahassee


29.8% decrease in the number of properties listed for sale

280% increase in the number of properties sold (from 5 sales in 2010 to 19 sales in 2011)

5.1% increase in the average sale price of a home

1.68% increase in the average sale price to list price ratio. (97.49%)

35 day increase in the average amount of time it took to sell a property. (110 days)

Southwest Tallahassee


9.1% decrease in the number of properties listed for sale

There were no sales in this price range in this area between Jan 1st 2011 and April 30th 2011 thus we have no sales data.

Summary of the $250,001-$450,000 pricerange



This price range has been marked by a decrease in the number of homes available for sale, an increase in the number of properties sold (with the exception of southwest Tallahassee, which had no sales in 2011), and a small increase in average sales price. The decrease the number of homes available for sale, the increase in the average sales price and the overall increase in the average sale price to list price ratio all are strong indicators that the housing market in this price range is improving. This market for homes in this price range seems to be shifting more towards the direction of a seller's market. However, while it is shifting in the direcition of a seller's market, it is still by large a buyer's market. Just less of a buyer's market compared to last year.


The only statistic in this price range that is not congruent with the rest of the data is the average days on the market. Overall the average days on the market to sell a home in this price range has increased from last year. However, this might not be caused by shift of supply and demand as one might assume. This could be caused by other factors such as lenders taking longer to process buyer's home loans. It could also have to do with foreclosure properties taking longer to close due to all of the recent problems banks have had with their foreclosure properties that they own.

The $450,000-$750,000 price range

Northeast Tallahassee

23.5% decrease in the number of properties listed for sale

The number of properties sold remained the same

3% increase in the average sales price

1% increase in the sale price to list price ratio

13 day decrease in the average number of days it takes to sell a home (165 days)

Northwest Tallahassee

14.2% decrease in the number of properties listed for sale.

The number of properties sold stayed the same

38.8% increase in the average sales price

13.52% decrease in the average sale price to list price ratio

55 day decrease in the number of properties listed for sale (282 days)

Southeast Tallahassee

66% increase in the number of properties listed for sale.

66 % increase in the number of properties sold

$914 increase in the average sale price

1.41% increase in the sale price to list price ratio

80 day increase in the average number of days it takes to sell a home 235 days

Southwest Tallahassee

There were no sales in 2010 or in 2011 for homes in this price range in SW Tallahassee

Summary of the $450,000-$750,000 price range

Overall, the number of properties listed for sale in this price range (with the vast majority of the properties being in the northeast part of Tallahassee) decreased in this price range. The exception was in Southeast Tallahassee where we saw an increase in the number of properties listed for sale. The exception was in the southeast, where we saw an increase in the number of properties listed for sale increase. The number of sales increased in 2011 while the average sales price stayed about the same.

In the NE and NW, days on the market decreased while average days on the market increased in the SE. Overall it appears that the market for homes in this price range has been very stable from 2010 until now. The relatively unchanged average sale price and the fact that the number of properties sold stayed about the same shows that this market is stabilizing. The fact that the number of properties listed for sale has decreased, and that the average time it has taken to sell a home in this price range has decreased from last year, shows that the market for homes in this price range in Tallahassee, might actually be improving.

The $750,001+ price range.

Northeast Tallahassee

7.3% increase in the number of properties listed for sale

Sales stayed the same

19.2% drop in the average price of a home

Sale price to list price ratio dropped by 13.22%

142 day drop in average days on the market (279 days)

Northwest Tallahassee

No activity

Southeast Tallahassee

No activity

Southwest Tallahassee

No activity

Summary of the $750,000 price range

Sales activity in this price range was very limited with only 2 sales occuring in this price range. Both sales were on the northeast side of Tallahassee. From the limited data we have in this price range, it appears that prices in this price range are dropping as well. The list to sale price ratio in this price range has fallen, indicating that buyers have more bargaining power in this price range. Days on the market to sell a property in this price range has decreased. This is most likely due to the fact that prices have dropped.