I know everyone is wondering how this year is looking compared to last year for homes sales, so here’s the real story.

Year-to-date as of 2/12/07 for Lancaster County

New Listings 10% up
Listings going under agreement 6% up
Listings that went to closing 1.5% up
Average sales price 2.25% down
Days on market (from new listing to under agreement) 3% down at 57 days
Expired listings 22% up
“Back on Market” listings 11.5% up

What does this mean?

It means that more people are listing, probably to take advantage of the great mortgage rates right now. Also, people are probably hoping to sell while they think they can get more for their house (based on the impending “doom & gloom” market the big media is pushing).

As a result of more listings out there, more listings are going under agreement. No big changes here. In fact, there are less than last year if viewed as a percent of new listings.

Despite all this new activity, only 1.5% more went to closing, which is a statistical non-number. So, what happened to all the new listings?

Wow, big increases in expired listings and listings coming back on the market…what this means is that more homes are either overpriced or not marketed well enough to sell and therefore expire, and more often buyers are backing out of transactions (for various reasons) forcing the seller to put the house back on market.

It still takes an average of 2 months to sell a house this time of year. If you do better you should feel fortunate…or well-priced. The price came down a bit this year but is still very high for which sellers can breathe a sigh of relief.

All I can say is “bring on the spring!”

Did mention that we’re expecting a snowstorm this week?