The Los Gatos real estate market is a moving target.  How's it today?  It depends on which part of the data you study.   Days on the market are longer, but prices are up, sales are up, and inventory is down.

Los Gatos Houses

Los Gatos homes sold and Los Gatos homes for sale:  first note that inventory is way down (from 200 a year ago to 134 now), the number of pending houses is up (from 11 to 51) and the medial sales price is up (though the average is down) year over year.  Are homes still slipping in value, or are they appreciating?  The answer to that question depends on a home's particular location, price point, school district, and other factors.  Some homes are still going down in value, but others are rising. The days on market are longer, from 32 DOM to 52.    A lot of indicators are "UP" but it's still not really easy to sell a Los Gatos home today. With 134 actives and just 25 solds, that's a 5.36 months supply of inventory - close to "balanced".  With 51 pendings vs 134 actives, it looks like the odds of selling are about 38% in any given month right now.

To see more data on the single family home sales for October, please see my RE Report for that part of the market.

Los Gatos Condominiums and Townhouses

The Los Gatos townhome and condominium real estate market is likewise better in many ways.  The number of sales is up year over year (9 to 11), pendings are up (5 to 18) and inventory is down from 48 to 37.  Days on the market are longer though, from 33 to 99. So again some mixed indicators.  There's a shift toward more of a sellers market with the months supply of inventory now at 3.36 months.  Condos and townhomes overall are selling much better than they were a year ago in terms of pricing (up substantially over a year ago, though down from last month).  Buyers are more willing to buy now, probably due to fantastic interest rates and perhaps also some of the great first time homebuyer perks such as the $8000 credit.

And to get more details on the Los Gatos condo market, please see my RE Report page with that data.

How is the Los Gatos real estate market doing?

For many homesellers in Los Gatos (and Silicon Valley generally), and for their Realtors, the real estate market is extremely challenging right now. Buyers have been wary for many months already, but now they're concerned about a recession and job losses, not just the possibility of a real estate sales price that won't hold its value later. It is a deepening buyers market overall, but especially within the market for single family homes.

So what is happening with Los Gatos home sales?

Inventory is rising among single family homes and condos and townhomes. Right now there are 197 single family homes for sale (it was over 200 last week) and 44 condominiums or townhomes. A year ago, it was 113 houses and 23 condos. A month ago it was 184 SFH and 45 condos, and a year ago October it was 104 SFH and 22 condos.

Sales were down in October. We had a surge of sales in September, but then the meltdown on Wall Street happened and buyers put on the brakes. In Oct 2007 there were 12 condos closed, but in Oct 2008 just 9 (and with far more inventory).  In Oct 2007 there were 17 houses closed, but in Oct 2008 just 13 (and again, more inventory).

The real estate market in Los Gatos is mixed, depending on the type of housing (house, townhouse, mulit family dwelling, mobile home or other), the price point (entry level vs luxury), zip code, school district, and more. Of the 13 homes that closed last month, 3 were over $3 million. Surprisingly, 5 were under $1 million. Most often, the vast majority of sales is between $1 million and $2 mil or $2,5 mil, but the middle seems to be shrinking now. It's a strange phenomena! Low priced homes are being bought because, I believe, buyers can "get into Los Gatos" at great prices. The luxury home market is often independent of financing, so those homes are still selling fairly well (despite the loss of stock value in Google and Apple) for now. The middle price range, which often represents move-up buyers who do need at least some financing, appears to be the most impacted market right now.

 

Condos vs Houses: Which Are Selling Better in Los Gatos?

The Los Gatos condo market, which was really struggling earlier this year, has been improving since May. The Los Gatos single family home market, though, is the opposite: it has been worsening steadily since May. The condo market is very small compared to the single family home market, though, so the overall picture is a deepening of the buyers market in Los Gatos.

Below, please find a bar graph that makes these trends clear:  

The Los Gatos real estate market is made up of many micromarkets. For information on your particular home buying or home selling needs in Los Gatos, please contact me today.

I have never followed the stock market so much as I have in the last two weeks. [My primary concern is my kids' 529 college savings plan, where the money is all in an index fund (that's how CA has it set up).]And I wondered if Los Gatos home buyers have their downpayments in stocks and may also be holding back, so I took a look at very recent sales data to see if there are any new trends.

From my initial study of the pending sales in Los Gatos and Monte Sereno in the 95030 and 95032 zip codes, it does not appear that a slowdown in buying is happening over & above what we were already experiencing prior to the roller coaster ride on Wall Street.

It may be that we will see a change in the Los Gatos real estate market that later we'll attribute to the financial catastrophe that is going on, but right now, I'm not seeing it.  Perhaps the Los Gatos and Monte Sereno home buyers have their downpayment readily accessible in cash. (That is the case with my buyers.)

The Los Gatos real estate market for single family homes is a bit of a mixed bag, with some indicators more positive than others, but on the whole, it's a deepening buyers market.

Below, please see the basic sales data on the closed single family homes in Los Gatos for September 2008. Note that saes are up, but days on market are longer, prices are mostly down (except the year over year average sp), and the list price to sales price ratio is dropping.

A good way to judge the market overall is by crunching the numbers to get the months of inventory (or days, or weeks of inventory), also known as the absorption rate. Next, please view the Los Gatos area (including Monte Sereno and some parts of Cambrian Park and possibly Campbell) known as "area 16" in our MLS.  This lines up almost exactly with Los Gatos and the zip codes 95032 and 95030:

As you can well see, it is going to take more and more time to sell off the current inventory of single family homes in the Los Gatos area. In fact, it is a strong trend that the buyers market has been deepening. The National Association of Realtors says that 6 months or less is a sellers market, but more than 6 months is a buyers market. We had a little dip in May through July where the sellers were under that threshold, but for the most part, it has not been much of a year for sellers in Los Gatos.

In most times, it's very challenging for buyers to purchase a home in Los Gatos as there are often multiple offers and high demands from the sellers. Buyers, now is your chance to get in at a reasonable time!  Sellers, if you want to sell, make your home gorgous and price it competitively!

To learn more, please visit my Real Estate Report online, an interactive monthly report that provides information for all of Santa Clara County, including Saratoga, Monte Sereno, Campbell, Almaden Valley, Santa Clara, Cupertino, Sunnyvale, etc., and separated by single family homes and condominiums and townhomes.

The numbers are out for July's sales activity in Los Gatos!

To the left, please see a graph for prices and sales of single family homes in the Town of Los Gatos. Note that sales prices, both median and average, are slipping, while the number of homes sold has been rising. This is welcome news for sellers.

With the Los Gatos condominium or townhouse market, things are less positive for sellers, but a great opportunity for buyers. (This is very much the situation in the Saratoga and Almaden Valley markets too - the luxury condo market is having a far harder time than the single family home market.) Prices are down and the number of homes selling is down also. Please see graph below.

Please visit my online Silicon Valley Real Estate Report to see much more data for the Town of Los Gatos or any other part of Silicon Valley's real estate market. Visitors to the site can navigate to view statistics and graphs for condominiums and townhomes or single family homes by region.

As always, the real estate market is comprised of many "micro markets", so please contact me for specific information on your particular home or neighborhood.

Mary Pope-Handy

What's the housing market in Los Gatos doing in these final weeks of summer? How's the real estate business in Los Gatos faring amid all the doom and gloom of the mortgage implosion? Are Los Gatos homes selling?

Anecdotally, I can tell you that lenders have tightened up their requirements, sales are down and buyers are pickier than ever. Buyers are waiting for prices to come down more for most homes (except the totally remodeled ones which are priced extremely competitively). Many sellers are not willing to sell in the current climate, so the local Los Gatos inventory is not terribly high. Some homes, then, are still selling with multiple offers, while others remain unsold.

Below, please see first the pricing, by quartile, of single family homes in Los Gatos. (These are list prices, not sold prices.) 

The first graph reflects the 95030 zip code, which is entirely in the Los Gatos School District.

The following graph displays list prices of single family homes within the 95032 zip code. Much of this zip code is not in the Los Gatos School District, but some of it is.

Next, please see the information for pricing of condominiums and townhomes in the town of Los Gatos, again by both zip code and by quartile.

Here's the report for townhouses and condos in Los Gatos by quartile for 95030.

And here's the same report but for the 95032 zip code:

Below please find reports based on listing prices by zip code and home type (single family or condo/townhome) as well as by zip code. The beginning of the reports will appear the same for both zip codes (95030 and 95032) but go deeper into the report and you will see the neighborhood stats, which are different than those of the town as a whole.

(1) Single family homes in Los Gatos 95032

(2) Single family homes in Los Gatos 95030

(3) Condos and townhomes in Los Gatos 95032

No report for condominiums and townhouses in Los Gatos 95030 - not enough info to generate a report.

Please let me know if you'd like to discuss your particular situation with me in person, by email, or over the phone.

Best regards,

Mary Pope-Handy
Keller Williams