Monday Morning Coffee Break: Ventura County Real Estate Doing’s for Week Ending June 14, 2008
June 15th, 2008 Categories: Weekly Real Estate Activity In Ventura County
Since November, 2007 Monday Morning Coffee Break has been beating the drums over the fact that Ventura County’s real estate market was very good. I felt like I was swimming against the tide.
Validation.
This past Friday (June 13, 2008) at the Marriott Ventura Beach Hotel, Bill Watkins, an economic forecaster and director of the UC Santa Barbara Economic Forecast Project told the Chamber of Commerce gathering that Ventura County is and will continue to do extremely well.
He pointed out that single family homes in Ventura County haven’t declined as much as homes in other areas such as San Bernardino and Riverside.
In the Ventura County area he confirmed that job prospects were up. The economy is up. The negative news that we see and read is still up. But negative news is what sells newspapers and keep TV watchers.
At this point in time Ventura County is in its’ own cocoon and is protected more-so than surrounding communities and is certainly far better off than many counties in California.
There are multiple reasons for this but suffice to say whatever the main reasons are it is good for Ventura County.
Each week the data is the same. Boring yes; but good for the County since it reflects an upward trend.
The market is up. Sales continue a trend upward. Inventory is going down. The variance between list and sales price is still above the norm as is the number of days sold homes had been on the market.
Banks are the fly in the ointment. They continue to make it difficult for first time home buyers and self employed to get financing. This will continue especially in light of increase credit cards and auto (and other) loans defaults.
Outside of California it now appears that Las Vegas real estate is starting to pick up. I talked to some agents Friday and they are now starting to get excited about their market. Building is booming both on the strip and in surrounding areas of Henderson and other sectors.
So it appears that real estate throughout the United States and in California in particular is on the upswing.
Please forward your comments to this update.
