I'm going to take a moment today to acknowledge that this is my 400th blog post here! I've enjoyed every minute of it and have learned more than I would have thought possible!

It's been fun hearing from you. All of you are the reason this blog exists. The purpose remains the same now as it was at post number one. This is here to give you, the consumer, more access to information on real estate in general and on the Fauquier (Warrenton), Culpeper, Prince William, Rappahannock and Warren county real estate market.

The occasion of the 400th post is prompting some reflection and analysis and watch for some adjustments going forward that will hopefully make this blog even more relevant.

And, because I wanted today's post to have an upbeat feel, here's an article on what I believe is ultimately a very positive sign for the real estate market overall. Work outs for troubled mortgages have not been happening in anywhere near he numbers they need to. This points to better systems and processes to make that happen.

And, one more milestone occurs later this week. Next weekend I'll turn 50!

YeeHaw!

The April numbers are finalized.  I did a sneak preview for you about ten days ago, before the numbers were official. And, the picture hasn't changed much.

In every county, the pattern is the same. Inventory has risen again, as has the number of new listings. After a dismal month in terms of sales in March, April looks better, both in terms of new contracts written and sales closed. But the number of houses sold is not keeping pace with the new listings coming on the market.

Fauquier, Culpeper are each showing about 16 months of inventory. Warren is looking worse at 24 months. Prince William is in the best shape at only 9 months. Rappahannock, being a special place, has about 3 years worth of inventory. But, again, the numbers generally don't give a very realistic picture of Rappahannock.

The more interesting comparison, of course, is year over year. Since real estate is very seasonal, that's always true. In general, inventory is higher than it was a year ago and sales are slower. There are some exceptions, but it's too soon to say if those are a blip or a true change in market conditions.

No bottom in sight would be my reading of current conditions. There is nothing to suggest we've turned a corner. (Although I remain hopeful that I'm wrong!)

Saturday's Washington Post carried a story about foreclosure activity that primarily looked at Prince William county. As the story makes clear, things are pretty bad in Prince William County. The number quoted in the article is that 5.5% of the homes in the county are in some phase of foreclosure.

I took a look at RealtyTrac, a web site that specializes in providing foreclosure listings. It shows 3204 homes in Prince William County in foreclosure out of 5573 homes currently listed for sale. It says an additional 881 homes are in pre-foreclosure. And 1932 homes are up for auction. Some of those auctioned homes are likely to be foreclosures, although certainly not all of them.

To give you a feel for the rest of the area, Culpeper County has 137 properties in foreclosure, 20 pre-foreclosure and 97 up for auction. That's out of 819 listings.

Fauquier County has 111 foreclosures, 2 pre-foreclosures and 93 properties up for auction out of 730 listings.

Rappahannock County has 4 foreclosures, 0 pre-foreclosures and 6 properties to be auctioned.

Warren County has 0 foreclosures according to RealtyTrac, although I seriously doubt their data on this county. There are 4 in pre-foreclosure and 73 listings to be auctioned.

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!

2007 is behind us and the December numbers are now available. And there's plenty of good news. In every county I looked at, inventory continued to decline. Culpeper moved down to 783 homes for sale. It was at 796 last month. And, at its high hit 823.

Culpeper is representative of the surrounding counties. Rappahannock, Prince William, Fauquier, even Warren, all saw reductions in inventory. I'd like to say it's a trend, but given the circumstances it's still too early to say that. November and December in an average year will see a reduction in inventory as people take their homes off the market during the holidays. If January and February numbers continue to show a decrease I'll officially declare a trend!

We also saw fewer new listings across the board. Again, good news if it continues. With spring coming this is one I think we can safely say is not a trend. That's especially true if we look at year over year numbers. A comparison between December '06 and December '07 shows a sizeable increase in the number of new listings.

The number of new contracts and solds was down across almost every county with the exception of Prince William. That may have something to do with the fact that Prince William is showing some of the most aggressive price cutting.

I also compared the new contracts and solds to a year ago. In Culpeper we're significantly lower, in Fauquier close to breaking even. And, while Prince William is up month over month, it's down year over year.

All in all, December was a mixed bag. As with most statistics, we'll have a better idea what they mean a year from now!