Cape Coral Florida's Real Estate Guide

Wednesday, March 03, 2010 Zillow:

NEW YORK--The percentage of U.S. home sellers who cut their asking price declined again in February and sellers made slightly smaller reductions in prices, real estate website Zillow.com said on Wednesday.

The median list price of homes, however, fell in January, Zillow said in a report, which was obtained by Reuters ahead of its scheduled release.

Nearly one in five homes, or 19.5%, listed for sale on the Zillow website had at least one price reduction as of the end of February, down from 19.8% in January, Zillow said.

Home sellers reduced prices by a median 6.7% in February, down from 6.8% in January.

The percentage of homes on the market with price reductions has declined steadily for much of the past year. In February 2009 more than one-third, or 33.2%, of homes listed on Zillow had a price reduction, and the median reduction was 8.7%.

The median list price of homes fell 1.4% in February from January, to $205,000, which is down 6.8% from the median listing price in February 2009, Zillow said.

The time that homes sat on the market edged down to a median of 105 days in February, from 109 days in January, Zillow said. Those figures, however, have risen from a 2009 low of 90 days in August.

In February 2009 the median time on the market was 109 days on Zillow.

Credit: AP

by ADRIAN SAINZ / Associated Press

Posted on February 26, 2010 at 3:13 PM

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MIAMI (AP) -- Home sales in the South posted an annual increase of 8 percent in January as buyers grabbed hold of federal tax credits and affordable prices.

However, sales plummeted 35 percent from December, a sign that the housing market's recovery may be on shaky ground.

The median sales price of previously owned homes was $140,200, a decrease of 2 percent from January last year, the National Association of Realtors reported Friday.

Nationally, there were 275,000 homes sold, a 33 percent decrease from December, but up 7 percent from year-ago levels, without adjusting for seasonal factors. The national median sales price was $164,700, unchanged from last January.

The year-over-year increase in the South was mainly driven by low prices, government incentives, and mortgage rates that have hovered near 5 percent. Homebuyers have until April 30 to take advantage of tax credits of up to $8,000 for first-time homebuyers and $6,500 for current homeowners.

Some analysts who expected rough winter weather to hurt sales were surprised at the annual increase.

"The bargains are so good that people were braving the rain, sleet, snow and frigid air to take advantage of them," said Jeff Humphreys, an economist with the University of Georgia.

Still, job losses, falling consumer confidence, high foreclosures and tight lending standards remain obstacles for a sustained recovery.

"There's a lot of underlying weakness in the world economy and national economy," said Bill Weaver, real estate professor at the University of Central Florida. "That's not the general economic environment in which people decide to go out and spend $200,000 on a house."

In the South, nine of the 19 cities covered by the Associated Press-Re/Max Monthly Housing Report showed sales increases compared with last January. Median sales prices dropped in 10 Southern cities.

The AP-Re/Max report, also released Friday, analyzed sales transactions in the metropolitan statistical areas recorded by all real estate agents, regardless of company affiliation.

Here are some highlights:

• Little Rock, Ark.: Sales fell 22 percent, the largest year-over-year drop in sales among the report's 19 Southern metro areas.

A lack of confidence in the economy likely led Little Rock buyers and sellers to hold back, with job losses hitting close to home, said Ethan Nobles, spokesman for the Arkansas Realtors Association.

"When you've got regular announcements of job losses or very little job creation, that does make people a little bit nervous," Nobles said.

Despite the drop in sales, the median sales price in Little Rock rose nearly 11 percent to $147,000.

• Orlando, Fla.: This central Florida city's basement-level prices led to a 52 percent increase in sales compared with January last year. Orlando's median sales price was $104,250, down 28 percent compared with the same month last year, the AP-Re/Max report showed.

Foreclosures sold at heavy discounts are keeping prices down and luring investors, especially in the condo market.

Condos can sell for $50,000 or even less, often for all-cash, said Lloyd Page, regional senior vice president with Coldwell Banker in central Florida. Even houses are selling for that little, though they are usually foreclosures in need of repairs, Page said.

"A lot of these houses are stripped bare and won't qualify for financing," Page said.

Coldwell Banker agent Cindy Brads said buyer interest is "tremendous" for homes $150,000 and below in Orlando. For anything below $60,000, it's not strange to get 20 offers for a property, with a large percentage coming from investors, she said.

• Houston: This Texas metro area posted a 10 percent increase in its median sales price, which was $143,500, the AP-Re/Max report showed.

Sales for homes $500,000 and higher rose 40 percent compared with last January, said Danny Frank, an agent with Keller Williams Realty in nearby Pearland, Texas.

Houston has been one of the steadiest housing markets in the past year. But it isn't immune to worries about the economy -- sales fell 11 percent compared with last January.

Slow home sales also hurts local economies, cutting into sales of home-related items like refrigerators and lawnmowers.

"That trickle-down effect affects everybody from Joe the plumber to Joe the brain surgeon," Frank said.

WASHINGTON (AP) - Feb. 17, 2010 - Housing construction posted a better-than-expected increase in January, which pushed activity to the highest level in six months. The solid gain raised hopes that the construction industry is beginning to mount a sustained rebound from its worst slump in decades.

The Commerce Department said Wednesday that construction of new homes and apartments rose 2.8 percent last month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 591,000 units. That was better than the 580,000 annual pace that economists were forecasting.

Applications for building permits, considered a good barometer of future activity, fell 4.9 percent to a rate of 621,000, but that was after two months of large increases.

In another sign of strength, Wednesday's report revised activity upwards in December to show builders were starting construction at an annual pace of 575,000 units during that month, much stronger than the 557,000 originally reported. Even with the upward revision, activity fell a slight 0.7 percent in December, a dip that was blamed on severe weather in many parts of the country that depressed construction activity.

Economists are hoping that housing is beginning to recover and a rebound in this area will help support the economy as it struggles to mount a sustained recovery from the deepest recession since the 1930s.

The strength last month was led by a 10 percent jump in activity in the Northeast and an 8.9 percent increase in the West. Construction was up a smaller 1 percent in the South and 3.2 percent in the Midwest.

The strength in January pushed construction activity up by 21.1 percent from the pace in January 2009. Last month's building rate was the fastest pace since July.

Construction of single-family homes rose by 1.5 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 484,000 units while construction of multi-family units increased 9.2 percent to an annual rate of 107,000 units.

The National Association of Home Builders said Tuesday that its housing market index rose by two points to 17 in February after having fallen for two consecutive months.

That increase in sentiment was likely influenced by a number of favorable developments including a report earlier this month that the nation's unemployment rate fell in January to 9.7 percent - still high, but lower than the 10 percent of the previous month.

In other favorable developments, mortgage rates are hovering around 5 percent, pushed down by a Federal Reserve program to buy mortgage-backed securities. And builders say they are also seeing a boost in the demand for homes coming from a government stimulus program. That program provides tax credits of up to $8,000 for first-time homebuyers and up to $6,500 for current homeowners who decide to move.

Bob Jones, chairman of the home builders, said builders were "slightly more optimistic that the housing recovery is finally beginning to take root."

Copyright © 2010 The Associated Press, Martin Crutsinger, AP economics writer. All rights reserved.