Home > Blogs > Kim Peasley-Parker > Kim's Sumter SC Real Estate Blog

Sumter, South Carolina Real Estate Market Part 2

By Kim Peasley-Parker

Real Estate Agent with AgentOwned Realty, Heritage Group, Inc.

November 17, 2007 02:48 AM

So what is happening in Sumter Real Estate? First if you look at a summary of the units sold in Sumter County, the numbers are not all that bad for 2007.

Units sold Year to Date	2004	2005	2006	2007
Through Oct.	1080	1332	1422	1312
Dec	1274	1566	1664

Through October 2007, 1312 units have sold through the MLS in Sumter County. For 2006, this number was 1422 and for 2005 the number was 1332, the surprise is 2004 with 1080 units closed. If you were not around in 2004, I can tell you about buying home then from personal experience. If you saw a home you wanted, you needed to write a contract on it right away or forget about it. Homes were not even staying on the market long enough to hit Realtor.com before having a contract!

When you look at the units closed year to date for 2004 (1080) vs. 2007 (1312), we have sold more homes so far in 2007. 2007 Units sold YTD is still higher than the total units sold through December 2004 (1274). This indicates that while the numbers are down YTD from 2005 and 2006, Sumter is still in a fairly strong market. (Nationally, we are hearing that home sales are at 2002 levels, again this is a national average number. Some areas are lower, some are the same, some are higher.)

So what is the difference in the market between 2004, 2005, 2006, and 2007? A shift from a sellers' market to a buyers' market. I do not have access to the total number of homes that were on the market from prior years or the total homes on the market for 2007. But all Realtors® agree, there are more homes on the market now than in prior years.

I do have access to the average days on market (DOM). In 2004, the average DOM was 122. In 2005 and 2006 this number edged higher and jumped in 2007 to 143.1 days.

Year	2004	2005	2006	2007
Average DOM	122.42	126.25	127.25	143.1

Homes are staying on the market longer and buyers have more choices when they are looking for a home.

So to recap the first two posts in this series, we know that real estate markets are local and Sumter has shifted from a sellers' market to a buyers' market. But what about price? Stay tuned to my next blog to see what is happening to the prices in the Sumter Real Estate Market.

Sumter, South Carolina Real Estate Market Blog Part 1