Following the Charlottesville area market trends

*Active in August 2006: 432
Active in August 2006: 441
% change: 2.08%
Contingent: -28.74%
Pending: -34.36%
Sold: -21.95%

Very, very interesting data. What do the data tell us about the Charlottesville and Central Virginia area’s real estate market? It has slowed – significantly.

The market is very good for buyers right now – good Buyer’s Agents are advising their clients that there is sometimes significant flexibility in asking and selling price.

From a general market overview, properties are still selling for 97% of their asking price – not bad. In short, don’t believe all the doom and gloom reporting. The market is different. There are more houses on the market now than there have been in many years. Is this a “sky-is-falling” scenario? Not in my humble opinion – market “normalization/cooling/equilibrium” – whatever you want to call it – qualifies as a “good thing.”

A return to a market where the timeframe in which houses are sold and resold is measured in years rather than months is healthy for everybody.

Daniel has the County-by-County breakdown.

*Only for those properties in CharlAlbemarle, Fluvanna, Greene.

New construction numbers in Charlottesville/Albemarle:

Sold from June 1 2006 to September 1 2006: 106
Sold from June 1 2005 to September 1 2005: 140
Sold from June 1 2004 to September 1 2004: 119
Sold from June 1 2003 to September 1 2003: 111

Was 2005 an anomaly? These numbers seem to suggest that the reports of the new construction market’s demise have been – how do they say it – greatly exaggerated? Now, if I were to delve in and see how many now are offering incentives and upgrades …