Today I'm going to talk about March's numbers for Rappahannock county.

First of all, a note to those of you who may be new to this blog or to Rappahannock County's real estate market. It is a much, much different market than the surrounding counties. The volumes are very small and so, in some ways, these numbers are less enlightening.

That said, inventory remains static in the county with 71 homes currently for sale. As with surrounding counties, inventory is up from a year ago, although not by a huge percentage. In March of 2007 there were 66 homes listed for sale. There were 11 new listings added this month as opposed to 13 in February.

The big new is that 3 sales closed in March. There have been several months in a row now where that number has been 1. So, percentage-wise, a huge increase! I wouldn't read it as a trend just yet, however! But it is good to note that there were also 2 new contracts written. Those numbers still don't look as good as last year's. In March of 2007 there were 5 closed sales and 3 new contracts written.

Prices continue to drop, even in Rappahannock County. The average sales price a year ago was $460,000. The average sales price now is $411,667. That's a 10% drop in one year. It's lower than the surrounding counties, but still not good news to sellers. A reminder to take average sales prices with a dose of salt for Rappahannock. With volumes so low and prices all over the map, this is a statistic that is often fatally flawed. But, year over year, right now, it looks reasonably accurate.

While new construction is a very small percentage of Rappahannock County real estate, it is noticeable that the new homes inventory has dropped over 50% over the last year. There were 10 a year ago and there are only 4 now.

In Rappahannock County,  much of the action is in land sales. There were three of those last month. In general, smaller parcels seem to be moving a little better recently.

The Rappahannock County real estate market remains steady, slow and not significantly different than a year ago. If you're a buyer looking in Rappahannock County things have rarely looked this good!

We're going to look at Prince William County statistics today.

Prince William is different than the other counties I look at here. Its numbers are better by far in almost every category. If you were only looking at Prince William you could be forgiven for thinking things had definitely turned around.

There are 5757 properties currently for sale. And, inventory is one of the few indicators that show the market headed in the wrong direction. Last month there were 5573 homes for sale. In March a year ago there were only 4527 homes available. 1631 new listings came on the market in March. Last month there were 1595. A year ago in March we saw 1764 new listings.

502 sales closed in March of this year. That's up 49% over last month! And, if we look a year ago, when 418 houses sold, we're up 20%. Again, year over year numbers are the more meaningful statistic.

Even better are the number of new contracts written. 820 new contracts were written in March of 2008 as opposed to 698 in February. That's a 17 percent jump. Again, I don't give that a lot of weight because things should be getting better. It's spring! But the really good news is that last year at this time there were only 508 sales. That's a whopping 61% year over year increase.

Now, here's why! Prices have dropped dramatically. The average sales price in March of this year was $299,586. The average sales price a year ago was $408,574. That's a price drop of 26%. Compare that the Fauquier County average sales price of $318K and you begin to see some of the reason homes aren't selling as well there. Do you want to commute those extra miles with gas prices headed towards $4 a gallon and traffic getting worse?

Also, keep in mind that one of the reasons prices have dropped faster there is the larger number of foreclosures. Banks will do what they need to do to get the houses sold and off their books.

The number of new construction listings is substantially down frm last year. The number of sales of new construction is relatively flat.

More than any other local county, there are signs of hope in Prince William County. Yes, the price drops are steep, but it's getting the market moving. Sellers in other counties should take note.

Today I'm going to talk about March's numbers for Fauquier county.

There is very little difference between the numbers in February and March. The total number of properties for sale in February was 730 and at the end of March we showed 734 available properties. That, actually, is good news. Many other counties continue to show substantial increases in that metric. 140 new listings were added this month as opposed to 153 in February. Again, at least it's moving in the right direction. There were 56 contracts written this month and only 44 in February. This is the biggest change in the month over month numbers. The number of houses sold last month rose from 32 in February to 35 in March. Not a huge difference, but an improvement.

Again, I think it's much more telling to look at year over year numbers.

Unlike Culpeper County we have not seen an explosion in inventory over last year, although we are up. That 734 homes for sale number is slightly higher than 723. We see a lot less homes coming on the market 212 last year as opposed to 140 this year. Unfortunately, that's where the good news ends. The number of new contracts written has fallen almost in half, 94 a year ago down to only 56 now. The same story applies to closed sales. In March of 2007 there were 62 closed sales. In March of 2008 only 35.

Year over year it's hard to see any signs that this market is turning around. The flatter inventory numbers do give me some hope,  however.

Prices continue to drop. The average sales price in Fauquier county a year ago was $368,565. The average sales price now is $318,249. That's a 15% drop in one year. That's significant. There's no sign that prices are stabilizing either.

We're not seeing an increase in new construction listings. And, new construction sales are almost non-existent. There was 1 last month.

Overall, there's not much here to raise your hopes if you're a seller. But there is lots of continued good news for the buyers!

The January numbers are out and there's more good news to report. This is starting to feel and look like more than an anomaly. (Knock on wood!) But there are still danger signs as well. Let's talk about all of it.

Culpeper county continues to see inventories decline. Actually across the board we're seeing declines, but perhaps most significantly in Culpeper. This is the lowest we've seen inventory in a year. And, while closed sales were down in January, the number of contracts written more than doubled. A good sign going forward. Given how busy I am with both buyers and sellers the past couple of weeks, I believe we'll see an increase in contracts again in January.

Here's the bad news; new listing jumped back up. New listings in December were 91. New listings last month were 161. Year over year, we're holding steady. In January of '07 we saw 165 new listings. Expect that number to increase again in February. Again, my personal experience with new listings coming up would seem to confirm that.

In Fauquier we saw many of the same trends, but dialed down. Inventory decreased very slightly, from 703 to 699. Inventory still remains above where we were a year ago. As in Culpeper, sales were down, contracts were up. New listings jumped significantly. By the way, this is not unusual. Especially in a tough market, it makes a lot of sense to beat your competition to market. And the spring will likely see a flood of new inventory.

In Prince William all the above trends hold with no significant differences.

Warren County is clearly still struggling. Inventory is down only slightly. New listings increased almost threefold and while new contracts increased, it was not by much. 

Rappahannock County seems to be looking a little more anemic right now. But the volumes are so tiny in Rappahannock that you'd be in sane to try and determine trends from such scanty data. There were no new contracts written and only one sale last month. Inventory decreased very slightly and the number of new listings doubled from the month before.  It'll be interesting to see how the spring market unfolds here.

So, let's see what the increased activity I'm seeing now does to these numbers next month!

It's time for another update on what the local market conditions look like from a statistical standpoint. The numbers I'm providing here are January, 2007 numbers unless I specify otherwise. These statstics are taken from the local Mulitple Listing Service (MLS).

We'll start with what I see as the most discouraging numbers: the total number of newly ratified contract in the Greater Piedmont Region (Fauquier, Culpeper, Rappahannock, Orange & Madison counties) in January of 2007 is 150. The total number of new listings entering the market was 485. Clearly inventory is headed back up again and that's bad for sellers. Buyers, life continues to look pretty rosy from your perspective!

Average days on market was 82 in January of 2006 and is now up to 148.

Average sales price as a percentage of list price was 94.59% in January of 2006. That number is now down to 90.58%.

Here's an interesting one for you! Average list price is up 2.66% year over year, but average sales price is down 1.69% for that same period.

Total active listings is 1903 as compared to 1334 last year at this time. This gets even more striking when you consider that just a month ago, December 2006, there were a total of 1260 active listings. I can confirm that I'm getting calls to take new listings almost daily.

What does this all mean? If you thought the spring would bring a hot sellers market, not a chance! For all those who are saying we've hit bottom, I doubt it! While there have indeed been more buyers out looking around they're not opening up the checkbook and you shouldn't count on them to.

If your home is not in top condition and priced very aggressively you are probably doomed to fail. If you don't have to sell right now, don't!

If you're a buyer, the news just keeps getting better!  Enjoy!

Dr. Michael Spar from the Weldon Cooper Center at UVA has recently produced a report showing the population changes in the state of Virginia by counties between 2000 and 2006. I love statistics and found some of these numbers very interesting. I thought some of you might enjoy them as well!

There is more detail and nuance in this report than I'm giving you here. It includes detail such as how much of the change is due to nature (i.e. births and deaths) and how much is due to migration.

I've listed some of the counties here. If there are others you're interested in, e-mail me at Julie@JulieEmery.com and I'll be happy to get you the information. Information on large metropolitan areas is also available.

So, now that you've seen the numbers...any of it surprise you? Any Rappahannock residents shocked? Any one want to hazard a guess at what these numbers will look like six years from now?

The existing home sales numbers for December were released this past week and we now have a complete picture of the 2006 year. If you're a seller, it wasn't pretty. But then I'm probably not telling you anything you don't already know! 

2006 saw the steepest drop in the number of homes sold in 17 years! That's a pretty tough market. If you sold your home in 2006, congratulations! If you bought a home in 2006, congratulations! If you tried and failed to sell a home in 2006, if it's any comfort, you're not alone!

In spite of those abysmal sales numbers, the price of homes, nationally actually rose by about 1.1 percent. I'm sure you're wondering about those numbers and I'll admit there seems to be a mismatch! Here's some of what I think is going on.

First of all, the calculate what's happened in pricing using the prices on homes that actually sold. In a down market what sells is typically the homes in pristine condition. And, they typically hold their prices better than the rest of the homes on the market. In addition, remember that all those people whose homes are on the market and who've lowered the price $50K and still haven't seen a buyer, are not even showing up here. I believe the 2007 numbers will actually show a further price decline, but that most people in our market won't feel it as much because it will just be a documentation of what's already happened. If you're a seller and you lowered the price of your home substantially, you've already mentally and emotionally taken that hit, even if it doesn't show up in the statistics yet.

As always, all real estate is local. That 1.1 percent is a national average. If you look at the numbers here locally they definitely tell a more dramatic story. We flew higher than most at the peak of the market and we're suffering more than some now. The greater northern VA area shows sales prices for 2006 down a little over 4%. As you get further away from the beltway that decline is steeper.

The National Association of REALTORS, along with several large builders says they've seen the bottom of this market. That may be true, but I don't think we'll know for certain until about May. I'll be watching to see how many homes come on the market and how many buyers show up to buy them.

Whatever 2007 brings it will still likely be a somewhat challenging one for sellers. And we may be nearing the end of the best negotiating opportunity buyers in our area have seen in many years!

As the data begins to appear, you'll see it here!  So stay tuned. RSS feeds are now enabled so you can make sure you don't miss anything!

If you'd like to read the MSNBC story on the December numbers, here's the link:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16806979/from/ET/