WOW! Tunes of Yummy Real Estate Market Stats Yummy Goodness!

In addition to this week's Market Update from MAAR I want to share with you this report.(Click on the following link for some cool graphs and such!)

JULY 2007 MINNEAPOLIS MARKET UPDATE

Here's some of the Highlights:

Minneapolis JULY YEAR TO DATE
2006 2007 Change 2006 2007 Change
New Listings 1,210 1,108 -8.4% 8,560 8,208 -4.1%

Closed Sales 511 461 -9.8% 3,427 2,636 -23.1%

Ave. Sales Price $272,250 $267,178 -1.9% $272,778 $261,905 -4.0%

Percent of Original
List Price Received
at Sale 96.7% 95.1% -1.7% 97.8% 94.8% -3.0%

Average Days on
Market Until Sale NA 124 NA NA 127 NA

Total Current
Inventory NA 3,738 NA -- -- --

Single-Family
(Exclude Condos) NA 2,759 NA -- -- --


T. J. 's Take:

The GOOD
New Listings are continuing to tail off. While there are less NEW options for Buyers they still have about a 9 month supply of homes to choose from. For Sellers they have less new competition so this is good for both.

The BAD
127 Days is a long time to have your house on the market. While we don't have comparable stats from last year, we can clearly see that this is something that would test the patience of almost anyone. This really indicates 2 things, in my opinion. First, quite a few Buyers are continuing to sit on the sidelines, despite the great interest rates and the plethora of choices and, second, some of the List Prices might still be too high.

OVERALL
I think you can look at this as being rather positive. Statistically July can be the SLOWEST month of the year and perhaps this is THE bottom that we can begin to grow from. Only time will tell, and as Merv Griffin once said, "Stay tuned."

As promised here's the Weekly Real Estate Market Update from MAAR:

Weekly Market Activity Report

Activity in the regional housing market continues its downward trend as buyers and sellers respond to a changing market landscape. For the week ending August 4, newly signed purchase agreements (pending sales) posted 802 residential unit sales, down 15.4 percent from the same week in 2006. Sellers and builders are slowing their activity as well, as new listings were 8.0 percent behind for the same time period comparison. In the last 19 weeks, this is the 17th week of year-over-year declines in listings.

This week's edition of the MAAR Weekly Market Activity Report features updated figures for Percent of Original List Price Received at Sale, our Housing Affordability Index (HAI) and our Housing Supply Outlook (HSO). The average percent received at sale for July was 95.3 percent, down slightly from last month. The HAI held steady at 127 due to flat interest rates and home prices. And our HSO grew to a 9.7 months supply of homes on the market.

To see how the Twin Cities housing market performed in July, see our July 2007 Monthly Indicators. This report features a new format designed to be consumer friendly and easy to understand.