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Aug. 31, 2006 - Cactus High football season opener

Defending Class 4A-I state champion Cactus High School opens its 2006 season Friday night at 7 p.m., playing host to the Mingus Marauders at Huber Stadium, 6330 W. Greenway Road in Glendale Arizona.

The Cobras, led by coach Larry Fetkenheier, carry a 14-game winning streak into this season after running through the 2005 undefeated and capturing the school's first state championship in football.

For more information on Cactus athletics, visit the school's web site.

(c) Jonathan Dalton, 2006 / Jonathan Dalton's Arizona Homes

Aug. 31, 2006 - TGE family service

Temple Gan Elohim, the Northwest Valley's only multi-generational Reform synagogue, will have its monthly family service Friday, September 1, at Body of Christ Fellowship.

Scott Leader and Rabbi Lisa Tzur will provide the music during this family-oriented Shabbat service. Services begin at 7 p.m. and an oneg will follow.

BOCF is located at 3760 W. Walhalla in Phoenix, just south of Loop 101 and east of 35th Avenue.

(c) Jonathan Dalton, 2006 / Jonathan Dalton's Arizona Homes

Aug. 30, 2006 - I'm not always right

Very brief post tonight ... two days of writers' block is hard to shake in an instant but I don't want to leave the blog blank another day. And so I write of the idea of blogging.

There's a simple reason I started this real estate blog several months ago (though I only started to post more religiously over the past few months). I wanted my clients and prospective clients to have a place where they could read and learn, if not about real estate then at least about me. The BA journalism I have in journalism should be worth something.

What's interesting is the more I post the more time I spend reading other real estate bloggers' posts. And many of the articles written, presumably for a wide audience, are about the best way to blog or the best way to attract clients through a blog - topics which I presume the clients couldn't care less about.

What's even more interesting is the tone - there is only one platform to use and if you're not using that blog platform you have no chance. Well, okay, so maybe I won't stand a chance because I remain with Internet Crusade and have found the platform easy to use. But I don't think the platform matters to anyone else.

In any event, the tone is one of extreme superiority and (if you'll pardon the yiddish) chutzpah. There is one local company that spends a great deal of time trumpeting its superior marketing through technology. They are right on all counts on every topic. Except their business results don't back up any of the braggadoccio. It might be better to shut down the eight posts a day and sell a house sometime. Call me crazy.

It's difficult letting your voice come through on a two-dimensional platform such as this. Do I really want the world to know how sarcastic I truly am? Can you build a sustainable real estate business based on the needs of smartasses first and foremost? I'm not sure. But I think I'm increasingly willing to find out.

Because I may not always be right but I do possess a certain advantage none of my competitors can claim.

With apologies to Chevy Chase, "Good evening. I'm Jonathan Dalton and you're not."

(c) Jonathan Dalton, 2006 / Jonathan Dalton's Arizona Homes

Aug. 27, 2006 - When will the worm turn?

As you can see through the absorption rate statistics I've been posting for the last several weeks, very little has changed in the Phoenix Arizona/Maricopa County real estate market. We have had and still have about a seven-month supply of homes, which means the market is oversaturated with inventory. And this doesn't include the builders' inventory of to-be-built and spec homes.

Add that to the impact of the calendar on real estate ... the kids are back in school and the holidays already are closer than you think ... and the question becomes, is the market going to improve before it gets even worse and, if so, when?

I can't give you a date for the market turning but I'm fairly certain of what conditions will need to prevail.  And it all starts with the builders.  With homes still being built and builders offering a series of incentives to sell the homes already in progress, the builders have played a significant role in slowing the resale market. In Sonoran Mountain Ranch in north Glendale, for example, sellers are discovering they lack the equity (and also the desire) to slash their prices to the level of the builders' prices post-incentive.

It's something of a Catch 22 ... the builders have inventory. Many of the homes were purchased by current home owners who needed to sell their property before they can move. If these would-be buyers are unable to buy, their new home gets added back into the inventory and the builders soon will need to add additional incentives to sell these homes.

So where does it end? Simply put, when the builders' inventory dries up. And in some areas that's already happening. At Taylor Woodrow's Thompson Ranch development in El Mirage, a planned fourth phase is on hold while phase three is sold. Presumably phase four won't begin until the market improves (or so we sincerely hope.)

Once the builders' inventory diminishes, the resale market will be the primary option. And sellers will be able to price their homes according to resale values rather than being forced to match the builders' bargain-basement pricing. And once the resale market again is the primary market, that inventory will slowly diminish and the market should return to a more normal balance.

For those insisting on a timeframe, my broker has been quoted as saying he believes the resale market will start to gain traction again in January. I'm not as willing to commit but I remain optimistic that such a timeframe is possible.

I'm not as shy in saying that I believe once the market begins to gain traction, the improvement will come quickly. Buyers who have been waiting on the sidelines will have a higher sense of urgency to enter the market once priced start to creep upward instead of down. (And creep is the operative word, as I don't expect to see a rise such as we had the past two years anytime in the near future.) Add in uncertainty about interest rates, and I feel once the inventory starts to move it will move somewhat more briskly than we've seen over the past several months.

And make no mistake, inventory is the issue. True, sales are slower than they've been in several years. But the market still wouldn't feel as soft if there were one-third less homes on the market.

(c) Jonathan Dalton, 2006 / Jonathan Dalton's Arizona Homes

Aug. 26, 2006 - Phoenix Arizona Real Estate update

Here are the latest numbers with one substantial change.

Rather than including all of the single-family listings in the Arizona Regional Multiple Listing Service, I've eliminated all non-Maricopa County homes from my totals. (While ARMLS is the "Maricopa County" MLS, many out-of-county listings also are in the system courtesy of member agents.) This resulted in the number of active listings declining by approximately 4,000 this week.

Also, I'm eliminating the second chart of active listings with week-over-week percentage change. As I've spent considerable time arguing that the number of active listings is meaningless without some additional perspective, it doesn't make sense for me to continue providing data I don't feel has any statistical utility.

And finally, now that we're several weeks into this, I'll provide some analysis of the data but likely will do so on a separate post in the interest of space.

Phoenix Arizona absorption rate thru 08/26/06

CITY	SOLD 07/27-08/26	ACTIVE 08/26	Abs. Rate	Change	Buyer/Seller
Ahwatukee	19	107	5.6 months	- 1.9 mos.	Buyer/Neutral
Anthem	51	828	16.2	+ 1.2	Buyer
Avondale	103	1,007	9.8	+ 0.7	Buyer
Buckeye	78	767	9.8	- 0.3	Buyer
Chandler	345	2,321	6.7	+ 0.3	Buyer
El Mirage	77	467	6.1	- 0.3	Buyer
Fountain Hills	32	363	11.3	- 0.1	Buyer
Gilbert	317	2,634	8.3	+ 0.3	Buyer
Glendale	298	2,040	6.8	+ 0.3	Buyer
Goodyear	96	1,144	11.9	+ 0.5	Buyer
Laveen	58	426	7.3	- 0.6	Buyer
Litchfield Park	39	488	12.5	+ 1.5	Buyer
Maricopa	61	782	12.8	- 1.4	Buyer
Mesa	436	3,079	7.1	+ 0.4	Buyer
Peoria	217	1,767	8.1	+ 0.1	Buyer
Phoenix	1,286	7,262	5.6	Even	Buyer/Neutral
Queen Creek	185	2,237	12.1	+ 0.1	Buyer
Scottsdale	313	2,829	9.0	+ 0.6	Buyer
Sun City	61	433	7.1	- 0.5	Buyer
Sun City West	46	356	7.7	+ 0.3	Buyer
Surprise	256	2,214	8.6	- 0.2	Buyer
Tempe	108	483	4.5	+ 0.3	Seller
Tolleson	42	340	8.1	- 0.4	Buyer
Waddell	4	107	26.8	+ 6.2	Buyer
TOTAL	4,487	34,096	7.6	- 0.2	Buyer

(c) Jonathan Dalton, 2006 / Jonathan Dalton's Arizona Homes