Happy New Year everyone! In Ft. Lauderdale there is definitely something to cheer about. Inventories of all type of dwellings in the greater Ft. Lauderdale area continuing to shrink quickly.
Despite a minor uptick in the month of November, December continued Ft. Lauderdale’s winning way and another significant drop occurred. As I previously wrote, November seemed to be an anomaly. The slight uptick was created most probably due to the expiration of the Federal Tax Credit offered to first time buyers. Likely in October, most saw the purchase of a home to be too late to qualify for the credit, so the first timers backed off. After the extension was granted, everyone came out in full force and this would explain the drop in December.
Currently, according to the Ft. Lauderdale Board of Realtors, there are only 7889 single-family homes available on the MLS. Multi-family dwellings are also experiencing a huge uptick in sales leaving only 13,052 actual homes as of January 11,2010. These numbers represent a huge actual drop from approximately 24,000 homes available 3 months earlier. 2009 was a turning point for the Ft. Lauderdale real estate market. When analyzing price points up to $400k during the time period from December 2008 until December 2009, single-family home inventories dropped by a whopping 56.7% according to Trendsgraphix. During this same period, multi-family inventories dropped a staggering 59.9%!
Many factors played a role in what seems to be a successful recovery in progress. In spite of the 15% true unemployment and 10% mortgage defaults, people are choosing to look at the glass as half full. There are 85% of Americans who possess a job and 90% who are current with their mortgage. Another factor is the Federal Tax Credit. Who doesn’t want free money? With the extension of the tax credit until April 30th for contracts and June 30th to close on the home, people want and need help. First time buyers see the merits of throwing out the rent box in favor of future tax deductions for property tax and mortgage interest. Many are educated in this area and waited for the pieces of the puzzle to come together. Finally, interest rates have fueled the fire. With rates now hovering around 5%, buyers and sellers are beginning to realize that these rates are artificially low and won’t last forever. Any sane individual that has the need to buy or sell is trying to do so right now!
Sellers, you can also be encouraged. According to Trendsgraphix, single-family homes priced under $400k are selling within 79 days of listing for a comfortable 96% of the asking price. In multi-family homes, it’s taking 93 days to receive an offer of 94% of the asking price. These statistics are awesome. They are better than some months during the boom years for real estate. Market conditions within the greater Ft. Lauderdale area are getting to a point of being a Seller’s market in some price points. With inventories of single-family homes priced under $400k now at 5.1 months and 9.6 months for multi-family, one can see why many homes are experiencing multiple offers once again.
2010 offers the market of Ft. Lauderdale a sense of hope and promise. The light is coming at the end of an extremely long tunnel. If you’d like to talk more on this topic, click here and make your comments heard! Happy New Year.
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