Where'd That Home Go? In Northern Virginia, it's Under Contract or Sold!

It was just here.  Now it's gone.

Ooohhh.  Here's another one.  Looks promising. Gone too! 

Okay... Don't blink.  Don't turn the other way for even half a second. 

Gonna find that home.

Wait, could've sworn this one was still available.  After all, it was on Zillow, Trulia, and REALTOR.com.  But, yet... it's gone.

What's happening? 

Where'd that home go?  That was our dream house!  Will we ever find one?

...

If you're like many home buyers today, you've had a fairly similar internal dialogue while searching the dearth of homes on the market in Northern Virginia. 

A quick look at inventory numbers tells the story.

Taking the current inventory of homes on the market in each jurisdiction and dividing by the average amount of monthly sales during the last 12 months, here's the state of Northern Virginia housing inventory expressed in number of month's worth of inventory:

Alexandria City:              2.11 months
Arlington County:           2.32 months
Fairfax County:               2.05 months
Falls Church City:            1.37 months
Loudoun County:             3.02 months
Prince William County:  2.28 months

Wow! Considering that a balanced market is defined by 5-6 months' worth of housing inventory, there's almost nothing available.  If no other homes were to go on the market for sale in Falls Church for example, houses would completely sell out there by mid-February 2012!  It's no wonder that homes are nowhere to be found. 

As a Northern Virginia homebuyer, you've got to be prepared to jump when the right available home comes along.

Take a look at the chart below which compares the average days on the market recently with the same statistic 4 years ago (blue line represents recent time period). Boy, has the market changed!  Houses in Northern Virginia are selling on average a full 30 days or more faster than they did back then.

Advice for Buyers:  Search for Northern Virginia homes today!  Contact me to see them as soon as you see something you like so that you don't miss out.

Advice for Sellers:  If you are serious about selling your Northern Virginia home, let's price it right, put it on the market and watch the buyers swarm!