Monday Morning Coffee Break: Ventura County Real Estate Doing’s for Week Ending July 12, 2008
July 13th, 2008 Categories: Weekly Real Estate Activity In Ventura County
The news of the past week focused on IndyMac, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and not the real estate market.
Similar to the Bear-Sterns take over, the Federal Reserve opted to do the same with IndyMac Bank.
Whether IndyMac is sold or not will not hampered the real estate market. In a few weeks this IndyMac problem will disappear, just like Bear Sterns.
Steps will be taken to shore up Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac as well.
Real estate interest rates will continue to stay around 6% over the next serveral weeks. There will be up’s and down’s of from 1/4 to 3/8 point swings but on average interest rates will remain flat.
Germain to real estate is that good news is starting to ease out of the wood work. Foreclosures are still high but now there is evidence that may be phasing out shortly.
Price of homes attracting buyers are generally below $ 450,000.
Ventura County real estate appears to have hit its bottom as listing continue to decrease; properties sold continue to increase weekly; the number of days sold homes were on the market has decreased; and the variance between list price and sales price of sold homes decreased.
Couple this with the fact that some sellers are beginning to reverse course and have started to increase their list price. Not many as yet (only one’s and two’s) but this was not seen a month ago or longer.
So unless some uncharacteristical event occurs to the general economy of the United States, Ventura County real estate is on the upswing and affordable homes are being scooped up rapidly.
Real estate investors have to consider that with high fuel and food prices the home buyers will purchase homes that are closer to the job market, shopping areas and schools. That is why Ventura County real estate has had minimal downside impact compared to other areas.
Overall it appears that the real estate decline, in general, will have run its course by the end of this year or the first quarter of 2009. Ventura County is slightly ahead of this time line by about 3 months.
Your comments are welcomed
