From Jonathan Lansner’s blog over at the Orange County Register comes a scenario that I’d expect is being replayed in many other key markets throughout the United States — housing inventories have increased in the past two to three weeks, combined with a literal freefall in selling pace. The result is homes that are going to take a long time to sell:
Jitters in world financial markets helped nudge the inventory of O.C. homes for sale past one year’s worth of current buyers’ demand, says Steve Thomas at Re/Max Real Estate Services in Aliso Viejo. Thomas calculates “market time,â€? a benchmark of how many months it theoretically takes to sell all the inventory in the local MLS for-sale listings at the current pace of pending deals being made … By this Thomas logic, it would take 12.12 months for buyers to purchase all homes listed for sale at the current pace of deals vs. 9.76 months two weeks earlier and vs. 6.79 months a year ago.
The NAR — whose existing homes report is due out this morning — should take note that not all of its constituents are busy making up data on housing.
