Things are continuing to improve in the Anne Arundel County residential home sales market.  For 2 consecutive months the number of sales has exceeded the number of new listings in the county.  This should begin to have a positive impact on the sales price that homeowners will receive for the sale of their home.

August 2008 saw 932 properties go under contract or sell outright at a median price of $339,900 for a total of $408,234,467.  865 properties were newly offered for sale at a median list price of $364,900 for a total of $423,657,356. 

Interestingly, in Anne Arundel County the final sales price has been hovering at about 92% of list price.  If you do the math on last months list prices versus last months "solds" the difference is 7%. A sign that the market is stabilzing.

On Saturday, August 31, 2008 Katie Arcieri of the Capital Newspaper had the following to say about the local market...

"Anne Arundel home prices steady despite national slump"

"Analysis of sales data shows single-digit price declines in most areas"

"For example, the year-to-date average median sale price for homes in the 21401 ZIP code of Annapolis stood at $393,635. That's a 5.9-percent drop from a year ago.

That's very good news for homeowners here when compared with market conditions in other parts of the nation."

"housing prices in Anne Arundel have remained relatively stable even as home sales have dropped by 20 to 30 percent in most county neighborhoods.

"You're seeing a demand pullback but not a rapid decrease in prices," said Dr. Daraius Irani, director of applied economics for the Regional Economic Studies Institute at Towson University. "Homes are keeping their value, we're just selling a lot fewer of them."

See charts showing Average Median Sale Price and Number of Homes Sold for each of the county's Zip Codes:
http://www.hometownannapolis.com/art/storypics/0831homeschart.pdf .