Well, it’s that time again…I postponed it as long as possible: the monthly Salem Oregon real estate market report.
Honestly, I am kind of happy with it this month, which sounds weird because it’s not like the data is great. I just like that the decline slowed down a bit this month.
In January and February only 77 and 74 homes sold in Salem. That is just too ugly for words and was an ominous start to the year. In March 115 homes sold in Salem Oregon. Not great (just look at the graph), but I’ll take that over 70 home sales any day.
So the market seems to be continuing on its normal spring pickup, just at a lower level. So normal cycle, just less volume.
March home sales are off 60% from the 2006 peak, or if you assume that 200 home sales per month is “average”, then our market is running about 43% off of average. Like I said, not great numbers but here is why I’m “happy” with the numbers this month.
- The inventory went down from last month’s 19.6 months to 14 months.
- The median home price remained stable. Last month it was $179,589 and this month it popped a bit to $183,000. Normally you would see a much larger jump up this time of year as “buying season” begins, but this is nice to see as well.
- The days on the market stayed stable. Last month it was 131 and this month it was 136.
If anyone out there is still expecting some type of v-shaped bounce…well…not sure what to tell you, BUT a plateau would be nice right now too.
So with this nice bit of data a few caveats…
- Oregon unemployment is still on the rise. As people start to burn through their savings they will head into foreclosure.
- The moratorium on foreclosures ended March 31. Notice of Defaults will start to be issued here in the next couple of months, and we may see a flood of those come on the market.
So, whether or not we plateau at this place or not remains to be seen.
If you have a question about a specific market sector (acreage, multi-family, etc) you can always just ask the broker and I’ll write a post about that sector.
The data in this post is compiled from data provided by the WVMLS. Data is for single family residential, non-acreage properties.
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