With January under our belt, I'm glad to announce, the Real Estate market in Edina and Southwest Minneapolis is really improving and shows signs of real recovery.

"Recovery" is a work I'm careful about using.  For the past 5 or 6 years we've encountered waves of new crises, foreclosure crisis, bank crisis, credit crisis, economic crisis... crushing any recovery at the time.  But strong fundamentals continue to fuel a strong Real Estate market in Edina and Southwest Minneapolis.

January has been beautiful in the Twin Cities, maybe it's the weather, or the good employment numbers, or the fact that people simply can't wait any longer to buy a home.  In any case buyer activity is growing.  Coupled with declines in listing activity, the result is improved inventory levels.

What does that mean for you?  Not much if your buying or selling today.  The market is still fundamentally the same, buyers want a great home in a great neighborhood for less and sellers are trying to figure out how to compete with short sales, foreclosures.  The good news is that over the long run I believe median home prices are stabilizing and that demand for homes is rising.  Maybe in a year or two we will feel the effects as the market begins to balance out.  For now we are still squarely in a buyers market.

Some very interesting trends to watch...

1) New Home Construction:  In the Edina and Southwest Minneapolis real estate market that means tear-downs, new homes built after tearing down the home that was there before.  This in-fill or tear-down activity has not slowed down in spite of the slow market in general.  One reason, cheaper land.  As the purchase price of the original home and lot has been hammered, the end result is a better deal on the new construction home.

2) The best block always wins.  As buyer activity improves across the Edina and Southwest Minneapolis real estate market you'll find areas where homes seem to always sell fast.  The old adage applies here, "Location, Location, Location" everything else being equal buyers always buy into the best neighborhood they can afford.

3) Interest Rates: I'm so sick of saying this, but, interest rates are so low!  If you need a reason to buy this is it.  Do not wait, buy now.  Even if prices do drop, a small tic up in the interest rates will balance out the savings.

Loving real estate Edina and Southwest Minneapolis, and loving this early spring time weather!

Ben Kolkman

Here they are ladies and gentlemen, the first home sales of 2012 in Edina and Southwest Minneapolis! 

It was an impressive start to the year with 11 homes sold in Edina and Southwest Minneapolis, however, the highest sale price was only $675,000 for this Minnehaha Parkway 4 bed, 3 bath home in Lynnhurst.

One home sale in Edina that caught my attention was this Kellogg listing which sold for $340,000.  This could be a new tear down opportunity.  While this particulat part of the neighborhood isn't the most active for in-fill or replacement housing it is right on the edge of some of the hottest spots.  Given the location and price, this could easily go either way, tear down or move in as is.

That's all for now.  Good luck to everyne going back to work and or school today.  Happy Monday!

Click here for: Home sales in Edina and Southwest Minneapolis week of 1/9/2012

It's been a while since I wrote but I'm back in the mood as the spring real estate market begins taking hold in the Edina and Minneapolis housing market.  As a native Twin Cities guy I am huge fan of winter and took some time off from writing to just enjoy the holidays and the season.  The weather has been unseasonably warm, a blessing and a curse, but its time to start talking about the real estate market in Edina and Minneapolis!

During the 'off season' we still succeeded in selling and buying a good number of homes with our home buyer and home seller clientele.  We handled some short sales which seem to be getting a little easier to transact (finally) here in the Edina and Minneapolis real estate market.  Our sellers found some success in alternative marking techniques via Facebook and Twitter which helps keep quality, detailed info on their homes in buyers hands.  

Historically, January brings new listing into the Edina and Minneapolis real estate market.  Sales volume however, doesn't begin to heat up until mid February.  On the minds of real estate professionals right now is wether or not this warm winter will spur buyers into action early or not.  My money is on the historical trend.  Personally, I still feel like winter is going to come, with a vengeance, I just hope by April we are back to sunshine and mud!

Happy new year and best of luck to all, especially to home buyers and sellers in the Edina and Minneapolis real estate market!

Here is a significant home sale that just closed.  If you are following new construction in St. Louis Park, Southwest Minneapolis, or Edina, this home represents a great value and sets something of a benchmark.  This new construction home just sold for $683,000 with with 5 bed, 4 bath and 3,352 total finished sq. ft. (2,288 above ground). It is located St. Louis Park, Browndale Neighborhood, and sits right across the street from Browndale Park. I've toured this home and thought it was a very nice home. It lacks much of the detail found in more expensive homes but, given the price point that should be expected.

See the Home's Public MLS Sales Info

Most importantly I think this home represents the "best of" in "value class" new construction.  The lot (and original home) was purchased for $238,500 and the new home was listed for $680,000 yielding $441,500 for construction costs, Realtor fees and builder profits.  That's a tight margin by any stretch and sets an important new data point in this market.

As for the home itself, I give it high praise for;

1) It's location, in a rapidly evolving historic urban neighborhood where new construction and large remodels are filling in the old homes.  There are a ton of other areas like this but the hot spots come and go quickly as you drive around blocks.

2) It's use of space on the small lot.  The lot is just 0.18 acres, and the builder managed to get a nice home onto a small lot, opening potential for redevelopment other small lots.

3) The features and amenities are all there.  Open floor plan, above ground laundry, nice master suite, etc...

On a sour note, I though this home also featured some suburban architectural elements, which put me off, and finished too much of the lower level which I prefer to use as storage, workshop etc.

The new construction real estate market in St. Louis Park, Southwest Minneapolis, or Edina is alive and well in this economy and has great upside potential.   There are long term investment strategies in rental property that follow and exploit re-development patterns.  There are, of course, short term strategies too, as this home represents. 

In either case there are market fundamentals to follow when re-developing an old neighborhood.  Adding the right features into a home that looks and feels appropriate to the area is one challenge the other is knowing where to buy and how much to pay.

Kudos to the smart builder and buyers of this well designed tear down and new build!

 

Good news for buyers and sellers in the Minneapolis real estate market. By all indications our local market has been marching toward recovery and general health all summer. "Twin Cities home buyers posted their 14th consecutive week of double-digit, year-over-year gains" according to the Minneapolis Area Association of Realtors. http://mplsrealtor.typepad.com/theskinny/2011/08/weekly-market-activity-report-3.html Autum will present the real yeast of this trend. As school starts and the cool weather settles in market activity will decline. We will be looking to see how this off season activity compares to past years'.

Does anyone know of a good property management company for a small condominium building? I've been looking for a property manager to take care of our associations day to day business but the big firms don't seem interested and managing a small building and other small buildings it seems are managed by the ownership. Maybe this is an opportunity. Is this niche market that needs filling? Does anyone have a good recommendation for me? Are you a property manager interested in handling the business at our condo association? Please let me know!

Over the period from 2005 to now a change in where the most pricey homes are located has occurred.  It use to be the Southwest Minneapolis, East Edina and West Edina all boasted high price sales on a regular bases.  Now a days its a different story.  East Edina is the only area consistently and regularly putting the high end sales on the board. 

East Edina's hallmark neighborhood of South Harriet Park has continued it's rapid redevelopment with tear downs, new construction and renovations, and has homes routinely selling over $1,000,000.

West Edina and Southwest Minneapolis however have not been so lucky.  Sales north of $1,000,000 growing less common in these areas. The two maps below show this trend by mapping the top 50 home sales of 2010, and by contrast 2005.

In 2005 the top 50 sales were well dispersed between the three areas of Southwest Minneapolis, East Edina and West Edina:

By 2010 the top 50 sales were far more concentrated in East Edina:

 

 

 

Minneapolis and St. Paul Neighborhoods are now available on NorthstarMLS Matrix for search and display to help serve you and your clients.  But did you know that almost every Neighborhood has its own Website full of resources for its residents?  Providing this information to your clients buying homes in those cities is a great service.

We created a map of the Minneapolis and St. Paul Neighborhoods that links to all of these sites.  Have a client looking at or buying a home in Minneapolis or St. Paul? Send them the Neighborhood Website link!

Click here to open the map.  Then click on any Neighborhood to open its Website.

While other metrics such as median home sale prices, time on market, and inventory levels continue to cause concern, the number of new homes hitting the market each month is falling and that's great news for everyone.  New listings have been down for a long time, no one wants to sell in a down market if they don't have to.  If this pattern continues, eventually inventory levels will normalize.

Here in the Twin Cities we have been dogged by oversupply in the housing market for the past 5 years or more.  You can blame which ever crisis you like, the foreclosure crisis, housing bubble, banking, or the economic crisis, all have contributed to oversupply.  And regardless of what happens to interest rates, taxes, or lending requirements, as long as the supply of homes exceeds demand by a large margin home values will continue to fall.

A balanced or "Normal" inventory level is 4-5 months according to most authorities.  That means that there are 4-5 homes for every buyer, or to put it another way, if no new listings hit the market the current supply of homes would last 4-5 months.  In most of the analysis I do for clients I am finding 6-12 months of inventory depending on the location, and it has been this way since about 2008 (note: It was worse 2006-8). 

For a while there the market was in "free fall" (2006-2008) crisis after crisis crashed down, supply was through the roof, and buyers dried up.  Today feels more like a slow, steadily pulling out of the fall.

Contrary to what you might think, some homes are selling very quickly this spring.  Home buyers and sellers in Southwest Minneapolis and East Edina (Linden Hills, South Harriet Park, Country Club, Morningside, etc...) may be surprised when they see some homes selling this spring as if it were 2004 again.

In fact, two homes on my block (Linden Hills) went up for sale and were under contract in less that two weeks. While the average time on market continues to linger around 5 months, roughly 10% of homes (17 of 158) sell in under 2 weeks in Southwest Minneapolis and East Edina.

When compaired to their competition (ake. others home in the same price range) these homes are almost always in better condition, and fully equiped with the features buyers are looking for.  They also have one other thing in common, an attractive price.  When fully loaded homes hit the street with an attractive price tag, buyers are snatching them up fast this spring.

Check out the 17 homes sold in less than 2 weeks this spring.