The market in DC looks fairly strong for those who are in the market. We took a look at activity in the last 15 days: sales of homes listed for between $200,000 and $1,000,000.
There were 267 sales in the last 15 days of homes in this price range. They sold in an average of 51 days at an average of 98.2% of the list price.
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
Thursday, November 19, 2009
U.S. Mortgage Rates Fall for Third Consecutive Week
From Bloomberg News
By Brian Louis
Nov. 19 (Bloomberg) -- Rates for 30-year fixed U.S. home loans fell for the third straight week, offering a boost to potential buyers who may use a government tax credit to purchase homes. The 15-year rate declined to a record low.
The 30-year rate dropped to 4.83 percent from 4.91 percent, the lowest since May, mortgage buyer Freddie Mac of McLean, Virginia, said today in a statement. The average 15-year rate fell to 4.32 percent, the lowest since records began in 1991.
Low mortgage costs and a tax credit for first-time homebuyers have helped increase demand for property this year. President Barack Obama signed legislation this month to extend the credit and expand it to include some current homeowners, which may lead to rising sales.
“We’re not getting a huge bounce,” in demand, said Donald Rissmiller, chief economist at New York-based Strategas Research Partners LLC. “At some point we have to get beyond just flat.”
Federal Reserve bond purchases from Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae, which package home loans into securities, brought down yields on the bonds this year, allowing lenders to reduce rates on new loans while still selling the securities backed by them at a profit.
The central bank pledged to buy up to $1.25 trillion in mortgage-backed securities bonds, helping drive mortgage rates to a record low of 4.78 percent in April.
The central bank’s purchasing program is scheduled to end in the first quarter of next year, the Federal Open Market Committee said on Sept. 23. It reiterated those plans this month.
The tax credit for first-time buyers was set to expire Nov. 30. Uncertainty over whether the credit would be extended may have prompted homebuilders to hold off on construction and led to a decline in housing starts in October.
“That definitely had a dampening effect on housing demand over the last month,” said Celia Chen, senior director at Moody’s Economy.com in West Chester, Pennsylvania. “Demand measures will pick up again in coming months.”
Commerce Department figures showed starts fell 11 percent to an annual rate of 529,000 in October, the lowest level since April.
To contact the reporter on this story: Brian Louis in Chicago at blouis1@bloomberg.net.
Last Updated: November 19, 2009 11:19 EST
By Brian Louis
Nov. 19 (Bloomberg) -- Rates for 30-year fixed U.S. home loans fell for the third straight week, offering a boost to potential buyers who may use a government tax credit to purchase homes. The 15-year rate declined to a record low.
The 30-year rate dropped to 4.83 percent from 4.91 percent, the lowest since May, mortgage buyer Freddie Mac of McLean, Virginia, said today in a statement. The average 15-year rate fell to 4.32 percent, the lowest since records began in 1991.
Low mortgage costs and a tax credit for first-time homebuyers have helped increase demand for property this year. President Barack Obama signed legislation this month to extend the credit and expand it to include some current homeowners, which may lead to rising sales.
“We’re not getting a huge bounce,” in demand, said Donald Rissmiller, chief economist at New York-based Strategas Research Partners LLC. “At some point we have to get beyond just flat.”
Federal Reserve bond purchases from Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae, which package home loans into securities, brought down yields on the bonds this year, allowing lenders to reduce rates on new loans while still selling the securities backed by them at a profit.
The central bank pledged to buy up to $1.25 trillion in mortgage-backed securities bonds, helping drive mortgage rates to a record low of 4.78 percent in April.
The central bank’s purchasing program is scheduled to end in the first quarter of next year, the Federal Open Market Committee said on Sept. 23. It reiterated those plans this month.
The tax credit for first-time buyers was set to expire Nov. 30. Uncertainty over whether the credit would be extended may have prompted homebuilders to hold off on construction and led to a decline in housing starts in October.
“That definitely had a dampening effect on housing demand over the last month,” said Celia Chen, senior director at Moody’s Economy.com in West Chester, Pennsylvania. “Demand measures will pick up again in coming months.”
Commerce Department figures showed starts fell 11 percent to an annual rate of 529,000 in October, the lowest level since April.
To contact the reporter on this story: Brian Louis in Chicago at blouis1@bloomberg.net.
Last Updated: November 19, 2009 11:19 EST
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
Dupont Circle Trends 2009
The trend in condo sales in Dupont Circle this year has been that the average absolute price has come steadily down -- from $455K to $396K, although the price per square foot came back up in the third quarter -- from from $496 in the second quarter to $527 in the third quarter.
The difference between list price and close price has come closer and closer together, from 96% in the first quarter to 99% in the third quarter. This indicates that sellers have become quite realistic in their expectations.
Average days on the market have come down dramatically from 53 days on the first quarter to 35 days in the third quarter. Again, this indicates a balance in the market between buyers and sellers.
The number of homes sold has steadily increased since the beginning of the year: 23 homes in the first quarter, 46 homes in the second quarter and 50 homes in the third quarter.
For a chart illustrating the trends in Dupont Circle this year, contact Kim at City Influence - 202-309-5209.
The difference between list price and close price has come closer and closer together, from 96% in the first quarter to 99% in the third quarter. This indicates that sellers have become quite realistic in their expectations.
Average days on the market have come down dramatically from 53 days on the first quarter to 35 days in the third quarter. Again, this indicates a balance in the market between buyers and sellers.
The number of homes sold has steadily increased since the beginning of the year: 23 homes in the first quarter, 46 homes in the second quarter and 50 homes in the third quarter.
For a chart illustrating the trends in Dupont Circle this year, contact Kim at City Influence - 202-309-5209.
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Washington Beats U.S. Housing Slump on Obama Budget
From Bloomberg
By John Gittelsohn
Nov. 2 (Bloomberg) -- Demand for new homes is growing faster in the Washington area than in any other major U.S. city as existing inventory shrinks and a record $3.52 trillion federal budget fuels the local economy.
Builders took out construction permits on 4,442 single- family homes in the Washington metropolitan area in the third quarter, up 11 percent from a year earlier, according to the Census Bureau. Nationwide, permits fell 17 percent.
The federal budget rose 18 percent this year to $3.52 trillion and is projected to grow to $5.3 trillion by 2019, according to the Treasury Department. NVR Inc.,Toll Brothers Inc., Hovnanian Enterprises Inc., Pulte Homes Inc., KB Home and D.R. Horton Inc. are buying land and reporting sales growth in Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia, anticipating job and home price gains in the region.
“It’s good to have a rich uncle and the federal government clearly isn’t spending less,” said Stephen Fuller, professor of public policy and director of the Center for Regional Analysis at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. “We’re on a rebound much faster than other locations because of increased spending to manage the economy and to manage two wars.”
About 15 percent of all federal procurement goes to the Washington area, Fuller said. In the latest example of federal largess, the administration on Oct. 29 endorsed plans to extend an $8,000 tax credit for first-time homebuyers, which is scheduled to expire Nov. 30.
Price Rally
Prices of existing homes in the Washington region climbed each month from March through August, gaining a total of 7.8 percent, as measured by the S&P/Case-Shiller home price index. The index for the nation’s 20 largest cities rose 4.8 percent from its low in April.
In Fairfax County, Virginia, the most populous county abutting the District of Columbia, September prices surged 12 percent from a year earlier to a median of $365,000, according to Metropolitan Regional Information Systems Inc. The number of total listings fell 28 percent.
Prices in the metro area are still 29 percent less than their peak in May 2006, the home price index shows.
“Do I see prices rebounding? Yes,” Dan Freire, a real estate broker in Ashburn, Virginia, with The Long & Foster Cos. “Will it be like earlier in the decade? No, and that’s good. For now, prices are up because inventory is going down.”
Leaving Iowa
Freire was the broker for Dean Cantrill, who transferred from Iowa to work for Cobham Plc, a British aerospace company with offices in Herndon, Virginia.
Cantrill sold his home in Iowa for $413,000, about $15,000 less than the listed price. He paid about $660,000 for a four- bedroom, 5,500-square-foot (551 square meters) house built by Pulte about 20 miles (32 kilometers) from his office. He paid more than the $639,000 listed price after ordering a finished basement, three-car garage and enlarged master bedroom.
Cantrill moved into the home last week. He said there is “about three or four times” as much construction going on in the community as when he looked at the property in July.
Washington ranked as the third-healthiest U.S. housing market -- behind Austin and San Antonio in Texas -- in a report published Oct. 7 by Hanley Wood Market Intelligence of Costa Mesa, California. In a similar report in February, Washington ranked No. 10 among the “100 healthiest,” based on job growth, household income and population projections.
New Construction
In the third quarter, construction started on 2,285 homes in the Washington area, which was 21 percent more than a year earlier and the biggest quarterly jump in two years, according to Metrostudy, a Houston-based research firm that tracks construction data in more than 80 metro areas. Housing starts in the region peaked at 10,600 in the second quarter of 2005.
In the entire U.S., construction spending rose in September as residential builders rushed to finish projects. Private residential construction spending increased 3.9 percent, the biggest gain since July 2003, the Commerce Department said today.
Housing isn’t the only type of local real estate benefiting from government spending, according to Michael D. Fascitelli, chief executive officer of New York-based Vornado Realty Trust, the largest real estate investment trust by market value, which owns 18 million square feet (167 hectares) of office and retail space in Washington.
‘You’re Paying’
“Washington is the best market in the country for apartments, hotels and offices,” he said at an Oct. 15 forum in New York sponsored by Bisnow.com. “And why do you think that is? Thank you very much. You’re paying for it.”
A bigger budget means more federal jobs. In September, there were 363,800 people working for the government in the Washington area, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, up 3 percent from a year earlier. For each new government employee, about 1.7 private contractors are added to federal payrolls, according to Fuller.
By 2011, another 82,000 new jobs will relocate from other states to military installations in the region through the Base Relocation and Closure Program, according to the Maryland Department of Business and Economic Development and the Virginia National Defense Industrial Authority.
The Washington metro area’s unemployment rate stood at 6.2 percent at the end of September, the lowest of the nation’s 10 largest metro areas, according to the labor statistics bureau. The national rate was 9.8 percent.
No Sites?
Washington’s median household income -- $85,824 in 2008 -- is also the highest of the nation’s 25 largest metropolitan areas, according to the Census Bureau.
As construction accelerates, builders risk running out of sites in some of the most popular areas close to Washington, said Bill Gilligan, president of the Maryland, Virginia and West Virginia division at Horsham, Pennsylvania-based Toll Brothers, the nation’s biggest luxury homebuilder.
“We could be looking for land and not have anything ready to satisfy demand in three years,” Gilligan said.
Townhouses, condos and smaller units purchased by first- time buyers are Toll Brothers’ most popular products in the Washington area, he said. Sales at the low end are creating a “trickle-up effect,” with opportunities for people to sell existing homes and trade up to costlier ones, Gilligan said.
Increasing demand has allowed Toll Brothers to decrease incentives -- such as discounts or extra features -- between $2,000 and $5,000 per home, he said.
In December, Lawrence Cutler plans to move into a new 5,500-square foot (551 square meter) Hampton model home built by Toll Brothers in the Patuxent Chase community in Ellicott City, Maryland. The brick Georgian-style home, which sits on a 1.1-acre (4,451 square meters) lot adjacent to a forest preserve, lists for $1.19 million.
Relying on Pension
Cutler, 67, who worked for 39 years with the Department of Health and Human Services, said he negotiated a lower price, which he declined to disclose, and sold his previous home after three weeks on the market. He said he knew he could afford the house because of his government pension.
“The federal government isn’t going out of business,” he said. “I wouldn’t have bought if I thought my pension was going down the tubes.”
KB Home, which reported a net loss of $202.5 million for the first nine months of fiscal 2009, announced in September that it had resumed building in the Washington area.
Top 10 Market
“We suspended our operations previously as part of our strategy of generating cash and lowering overhead,” Jeffrey T. Mezger, KB Home president and CEO, said during a Sept. 25 conference call. “The region is a top-10 market that is beginning to demonstrate stability.”
Fort Worth, Texas-based D.R. Horton, the second-largest U.S. homebuilder by revenue, said on its Web site that there are more than 30 finished homes available at its developments in Virginia to take advantage of the tax credit.
“We’re one of the few builders with inventory,” Dave McCarthy, D.R. Horton’s director of sales and marketing for Northern Virginia, said in a phone interview.
NVR, the nation’s fourth-largest homebuilder by revenue, has the biggest share of the Washington-area market, with about 20 percent, and also has the best balance sheet of the publicly traded homebuilders, said Josh Spencer, a housing analyst with T. Rowe Price Group Inc. in Baltimore.
The Reston, Virginia-based company said profit almost doubled last quarter from a year earlier to $72.1 million. About half of its revenue came from the Washington-Baltimore area. Dan Malzahn, a spokesman for NVR, didn’t respond to phone messages and e-mails seeking comment.
Thomas Lawler, an independent economist in Leesburg, Virginia, who worked for Fannie Mae for 22 years, said he already sees signs of builders bidding up land prices and building speculative homes that could lead to an inventory bulge.
“You don’t want a situation where builders say it sucks everywhere but D.C., so let’s go there,” he said.
To contact the reporter on this story: John Gittelsohn in New York at johngitt@bloomberg.net.
By John Gittelsohn
Nov. 2 (Bloomberg) -- Demand for new homes is growing faster in the Washington area than in any other major U.S. city as existing inventory shrinks and a record $3.52 trillion federal budget fuels the local economy.
Builders took out construction permits on 4,442 single- family homes in the Washington metropolitan area in the third quarter, up 11 percent from a year earlier, according to the Census Bureau. Nationwide, permits fell 17 percent.
The federal budget rose 18 percent this year to $3.52 trillion and is projected to grow to $5.3 trillion by 2019, according to the Treasury Department. NVR Inc.,Toll Brothers Inc., Hovnanian Enterprises Inc., Pulte Homes Inc., KB Home and D.R. Horton Inc. are buying land and reporting sales growth in Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia, anticipating job and home price gains in the region.
“It’s good to have a rich uncle and the federal government clearly isn’t spending less,” said Stephen Fuller, professor of public policy and director of the Center for Regional Analysis at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. “We’re on a rebound much faster than other locations because of increased spending to manage the economy and to manage two wars.”
About 15 percent of all federal procurement goes to the Washington area, Fuller said. In the latest example of federal largess, the administration on Oct. 29 endorsed plans to extend an $8,000 tax credit for first-time homebuyers, which is scheduled to expire Nov. 30.
Price Rally
Prices of existing homes in the Washington region climbed each month from March through August, gaining a total of 7.8 percent, as measured by the S&P/Case-Shiller home price index. The index for the nation’s 20 largest cities rose 4.8 percent from its low in April.
In Fairfax County, Virginia, the most populous county abutting the District of Columbia, September prices surged 12 percent from a year earlier to a median of $365,000, according to Metropolitan Regional Information Systems Inc. The number of total listings fell 28 percent.
Prices in the metro area are still 29 percent less than their peak in May 2006, the home price index shows.
“Do I see prices rebounding? Yes,” Dan Freire, a real estate broker in Ashburn, Virginia, with The Long & Foster Cos. “Will it be like earlier in the decade? No, and that’s good. For now, prices are up because inventory is going down.”
Leaving Iowa
Freire was the broker for Dean Cantrill, who transferred from Iowa to work for Cobham Plc, a British aerospace company with offices in Herndon, Virginia.
Cantrill sold his home in Iowa for $413,000, about $15,000 less than the listed price. He paid about $660,000 for a four- bedroom, 5,500-square-foot (551 square meters) house built by Pulte about 20 miles (32 kilometers) from his office. He paid more than the $639,000 listed price after ordering a finished basement, three-car garage and enlarged master bedroom.
Cantrill moved into the home last week. He said there is “about three or four times” as much construction going on in the community as when he looked at the property in July.
Washington ranked as the third-healthiest U.S. housing market -- behind Austin and San Antonio in Texas -- in a report published Oct. 7 by Hanley Wood Market Intelligence of Costa Mesa, California. In a similar report in February, Washington ranked No. 10 among the “100 healthiest,” based on job growth, household income and population projections.
New Construction
In the third quarter, construction started on 2,285 homes in the Washington area, which was 21 percent more than a year earlier and the biggest quarterly jump in two years, according to Metrostudy, a Houston-based research firm that tracks construction data in more than 80 metro areas. Housing starts in the region peaked at 10,600 in the second quarter of 2005.
In the entire U.S., construction spending rose in September as residential builders rushed to finish projects. Private residential construction spending increased 3.9 percent, the biggest gain since July 2003, the Commerce Department said today.
Housing isn’t the only type of local real estate benefiting from government spending, according to Michael D. Fascitelli, chief executive officer of New York-based Vornado Realty Trust, the largest real estate investment trust by market value, which owns 18 million square feet (167 hectares) of office and retail space in Washington.
‘You’re Paying’
“Washington is the best market in the country for apartments, hotels and offices,” he said at an Oct. 15 forum in New York sponsored by Bisnow.com. “And why do you think that is? Thank you very much. You’re paying for it.”
A bigger budget means more federal jobs. In September, there were 363,800 people working for the government in the Washington area, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, up 3 percent from a year earlier. For each new government employee, about 1.7 private contractors are added to federal payrolls, according to Fuller.
By 2011, another 82,000 new jobs will relocate from other states to military installations in the region through the Base Relocation and Closure Program, according to the Maryland Department of Business and Economic Development and the Virginia National Defense Industrial Authority.
The Washington metro area’s unemployment rate stood at 6.2 percent at the end of September, the lowest of the nation’s 10 largest metro areas, according to the labor statistics bureau. The national rate was 9.8 percent.
No Sites?
Washington’s median household income -- $85,824 in 2008 -- is also the highest of the nation’s 25 largest metropolitan areas, according to the Census Bureau.
As construction accelerates, builders risk running out of sites in some of the most popular areas close to Washington, said Bill Gilligan, president of the Maryland, Virginia and West Virginia division at Horsham, Pennsylvania-based Toll Brothers, the nation’s biggest luxury homebuilder.
“We could be looking for land and not have anything ready to satisfy demand in three years,” Gilligan said.
Townhouses, condos and smaller units purchased by first- time buyers are Toll Brothers’ most popular products in the Washington area, he said. Sales at the low end are creating a “trickle-up effect,” with opportunities for people to sell existing homes and trade up to costlier ones, Gilligan said.
Increasing demand has allowed Toll Brothers to decrease incentives -- such as discounts or extra features -- between $2,000 and $5,000 per home, he said.
In December, Lawrence Cutler plans to move into a new 5,500-square foot (551 square meter) Hampton model home built by Toll Brothers in the Patuxent Chase community in Ellicott City, Maryland. The brick Georgian-style home, which sits on a 1.1-acre (4,451 square meters) lot adjacent to a forest preserve, lists for $1.19 million.
Relying on Pension
Cutler, 67, who worked for 39 years with the Department of Health and Human Services, said he negotiated a lower price, which he declined to disclose, and sold his previous home after three weeks on the market. He said he knew he could afford the house because of his government pension.
“The federal government isn’t going out of business,” he said. “I wouldn’t have bought if I thought my pension was going down the tubes.”
KB Home, which reported a net loss of $202.5 million for the first nine months of fiscal 2009, announced in September that it had resumed building in the Washington area.
Top 10 Market
“We suspended our operations previously as part of our strategy of generating cash and lowering overhead,” Jeffrey T. Mezger, KB Home president and CEO, said during a Sept. 25 conference call. “The region is a top-10 market that is beginning to demonstrate stability.”
Fort Worth, Texas-based D.R. Horton, the second-largest U.S. homebuilder by revenue, said on its Web site that there are more than 30 finished homes available at its developments in Virginia to take advantage of the tax credit.
“We’re one of the few builders with inventory,” Dave McCarthy, D.R. Horton’s director of sales and marketing for Northern Virginia, said in a phone interview.
NVR, the nation’s fourth-largest homebuilder by revenue, has the biggest share of the Washington-area market, with about 20 percent, and also has the best balance sheet of the publicly traded homebuilders, said Josh Spencer, a housing analyst with T. Rowe Price Group Inc. in Baltimore.
The Reston, Virginia-based company said profit almost doubled last quarter from a year earlier to $72.1 million. About half of its revenue came from the Washington-Baltimore area. Dan Malzahn, a spokesman for NVR, didn’t respond to phone messages and e-mails seeking comment.
Thomas Lawler, an independent economist in Leesburg, Virginia, who worked for Fannie Mae for 22 years, said he already sees signs of builders bidding up land prices and building speculative homes that could lead to an inventory bulge.
“You don’t want a situation where builders say it sucks everywhere but D.C., so let’s go there,” he said.
To contact the reporter on this story: John Gittelsohn in New York at johngitt@bloomberg.net.
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Dupont Circle Third Quarter 2009
CONDOS SOLD IN DUPONT CIRCLE
In the third quarter of 2009, we found that the average number of bedrooms in a sold Dupont Circle condo was 1.2, reflecting the large number of studios and one-bedrooms in the neighborhood. We also found the following details about condo sales:
Average List Price: $399,074
Average Sales Price: $396,160 or 99% of list price
Average price per square foot: $527
Average days on market: 35
Average age: 71 (reflecting the large number of row home conversions to condo)
These statistics reveal a healthy market with buyers and sellers in a good equilibrium. Sellers are realistic in pricing their homes and achieving 99% of their asking price within 35 days on average.
In the third quarter of 2009, we found that the average number of bedrooms in a sold Dupont Circle condo was 1.2, reflecting the large number of studios and one-bedrooms in the neighborhood. We also found the following details about condo sales:
Average List Price: $399,074
Average Sales Price: $396,160 or 99% of list price
Average price per square foot: $527
Average days on market: 35
Average age: 71 (reflecting the large number of row home conversions to condo)
These statistics reveal a healthy market with buyers and sellers in a good equilibrium. Sellers are realistic in pricing their homes and achieving 99% of their asking price within 35 days on average.
Thursday, October 8, 2009
Real Estate Round-Up
Focus on Logan Circle:
Here are some micro statistics about third quarter 2009 activity in the Logan Circle condo market (properties less than 6 years old).
Average sales price: $501,490
Average size of condo: 991 square feet
Average days on market (resales): 35
Average closed price as a percentage of list price: 98%
Average square foot price: $517
Percentage of sales with seller subsidies: 54%
Here are some micro statistics about third quarter 2009 activity in the Logan Circle condo market (properties less than 6 years old).
Average sales price: $501,490
Average size of condo: 991 square feet
Average days on market (resales): 35
Average closed price as a percentage of list price: 98%
Average square foot price: $517
Percentage of sales with seller subsidies: 54%
Thursday, October 1, 2009
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
