Housing Market in Charlotte, NC. Showing Signs Of Stabilizing

The economic outlook for the housing market in Charlotte, NC. seems to be taking a swing in the direction to being more stabilized after years of uncertainty. As unemployment figures decrease and more companies are relocating to the Charlotte, NC. area the housing market is starting to feel the positive effects of that. January started the year off to a good start and quickly looks like it is a momentum builder for the year ahead. A quick snapshot of January 2012 to January 2011 showed that home sales rose 9.2%. That is one of the largest increases since the downturn (not factoring in the home buyer tax credit time period). Those home sales were homes that actually closed...A very positive sign for the housing market. Skeptics will say but there is a lot of other inventory homes available out there to buy. Well actually from last year inventory levels are down an astonishing 23.6%. That is almost one fourth of what was out there last year. Inventory levels have been slowly dwindling. But this is a large drop off. Even going back two years I found the numbers are reflecting us getting back to a more stable market. Sold homes rose 18% from January 2010 numbers. Average homes on the market has dropped 34% since January 2010. Now, home prices are not reflected in the change in inventory levels yet...I am uncertain as to why; except that short sales and bank owned properties still account for over one third of all sales out there last year. AS the average home price remained relatively the same from January 2011 to January 2012 decreasing only .1% and decreased 8.7% since January 2010. As inventory levels begin to go down I think we are going to see home prices starting to slowly creep back up. It is a basic economic situation. Supply and demand. When the supply is greater than the demand prices are lower and when the demand is greater than the supply prices are higher. A balanced market is said to be six month supply of homes available based on closed transactions. Based on January sale numbers we are now at 8.8 months’ supply down from 13 months in January 2010. All this bodes well for buyers and sellers today. Rates are historically low. Making your buying power greater. Rents are increasing faster than income because of demand. This is pushing more buyers to buy now. A wise investment. Sellers are going to start to be able to sell their homes and get what would be a fair market value in a stable economy and housing market.... Dave diCecco Realtor/Broker www.davedicecco.com