According to the latest figures from the Santa Fe Association of Realtors, the number of sales is up and the number of properties for sale is down. During the first three months of 2012, there were 249 sales of single-family homes in the City and County of Santa Fe, up 16.4 percent from 214 sales in the City and County of Santa Fe in first three months of 2011. The inventory of all available properties for sale during the last quarter was 1,413, down 17.1 percent from the first quarter of 2011, which was down 17.2 percent from the first quarter of 2010.
During a presentation Wednesday, April 11, 2012, association officers said the statistics from the first quarter of 2012 show:
• Santa Fe housing prices remain low, compared to their high point in the second quarter of 2008.
• The upswing in the number of sales is due to low prices, low interest rates and buyer concerns that both prices and rates could soon go up.
• Fewer properties are on the market which may be due to sellers taking advantage of low interest rate to refinance, allowing them to hold off in hopes that sales prices will improve.
“There’s a substantial uptick in the number of people looking for houses and some increase in the number of sales,” said association President Dan H. Wright.
Association President-elect Victoria Murphy, added that a number of people from out of state who had been looking for a home in Santa Fe recently have decided to go ahead with purchasing because they think both prices and interest rates soon will rise.
The median sales price of a single-family dwelling in both the city and county in the first quater of 2012 was $352,000, which is down less than 1 percent from $355,000 in the first quarter of 2011. In a press release accompanying the first quater data Mr. Wright observed, “The Santa Fe single family housing market continues to stablize when you look at prices with sales up modestly over last year.”
Santa Fe Realtors Association officers say if the inventory of available housing continues to fall, it will push the median prices up.
The recent figures also show a 8.4% decrease in the number of days properties remain on the market, 247 days, compared to 270 days a year earlier.
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