Wasilla Real Estate News, Valley Market Real Estate

Wasilla Real Estate News, Monday Market Memo for March 10-16, 2009 March 16th, 2009

Categories: Monday Market Memo

Wasilla Real Estate News statistics for the week of March 10-16, 2009. These are the statistics for all single family homes in the Matanuska-Susitna Borough.

Notice that the inventory continues to rise. This is normal for spring, although this week there were three times as many listings coming on the market as were leaving the market. So right now, that means there are three times as many sellers as there are buyers.

Having more sellers than buyers in the spring is not abnormal, but the difference does seem to be higher than normal.

For the buyers that are looking, there are some great houses out there at attractive prices.

We listed three nice homes this week:

The nice homes tend to go quickly. Many of the homes coming on the market this spring are definitely priced to sell.

If you would like to have the new listings sent to you as soon as they come on the market drop me a line at marty@valleymarket.com . Ask for specific criteria and your search will be specific. With this program you will see the listings before they are on www.alaskarealestate.com and they will meet your specific criteria. Just send your name, email and phone number and I will set it up for you.

You can also get on the foreclosure list where you will see the new foreclosures before they hit the internet.

This representation is based in whole or in part on data supplied by, and to, the subscribers of Alaska Multiple Listing Service, Inc. (AK MLS, Inc.). AK MLS, Inc. does not guarantee nor is it in any way responsible for its accuracy. Data maintained by AK MLS, Inc. is for its own use and may not reflect all real estate activity in the market.

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Monday Market Memo, March 3-9, 2009 March 9th, 2009

Categories: Monday Market Memo

Here are the Wasilla and Palmer real estate statistics for March 3-9, 2009. These statistics include all single family residences for the whole Matanuska-Susitna Borough.

You will notice that the volume for everything fell this week. That even includes new listings which I would expect to remain high between now and spring.

The closed sale numbers are looking at 30-45 day old data because it takes about that long for a pending sale to work its way through to a closing. The pendings and active listings are very current information.

I checked to see how our sales so far this year have compared to last year. It appears that the volume of closed sales are down about 18% so far this year. We had 140 closed sales by this time last year and about 115 this year. That will tend to put downward pressure on prices since the same amount of sellers are competing for fewer buyers.

Three of the 14 closings were new construction. New construction has remained surprisingly strong, hanging in at about 25% of the total market. Builders have been able to adapt to the market, building homes that meet buyer’s budgets and competing with the existing homes.

A big advantage this year for first time home buyers is to get a 5 star plus energy rated home and receive a $7,500 cash rebate from Alaska Housing while also getting an $8,000 tax credit from the Federal Government. It is likely that the cash rebate will run out of money sometime this year. It is available for all purchasers of new 5 star plus homes. If you would like to find out more about his email me at marty@valleymarket.com or give me a call on my cell phone at 232-7900.

Only one of the closed sales was a foreclosure. The foreclosures are not driving our market like they are in many of the harder hit areas of the country. Still, many foreclosures are often good deals. There are currently 30 foreclosures on the market. I am not allowed by MLS rules to post them on my website, but I can add you to a list of people that automatically receive every new foreclosure the day it hits the market. Just send me your name, number, and email address at marty@valleymarket.com and I will add you to the list.

Also, if you are searching for a particular type of property, in a certain area, at a certain price, I can set up an search that will automatically send you the detailed report as soon as that property hits the market. The search can be as detailed or as general as you like. Again, just send me your name, phone number and email address.

This representation is based in whole or in part on data supplied by, and to, the subscribers of Alaska Multiple Listing Service, Inc. (AK MLS, Inc.). AK MLS, Inc. does not guarantee nor is it in any way responsible for its accuracy. Data maintained by AK MLS, Inc. is for its own use and may not reflect all real estate activity in the market.

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Monday Market Memo for Feb 24-March 2, 2009 March 3rd, 2009

Categories: Monday Market Memo

Here are the statistics for Wasilla Real Estate and the rest of the Mat-Su borough for the week.

It appears that life is coming back into the real estate market. After several very slow months, the last two weeks have been very active.

Interest rates are low, first time home buyers receive an $8,000 tax rebate and purchasers of new 5 star plus houses receive an additonal $7,500 energy rebate. That’s $15,500 extra in your pocket if you play it right.

The inventory continues to grow but pending sales and closed sales were much stronger this week. That will likely continue to be the case as we move through spring.

I do notice that the houses that are selling seem to be lower and lower in price as time passes. The whole inventory also is lower priced. This is probably a combination of sellers actually lowering their prices, and buyers only focusing on the lower end of the housing prices.

The good interest rates and the availability of rebates present an opportunity for buyers that hasn’t been here anytime during my real estate career. I imagine you would need to go back at least 50 years to see interest rates this low, and even then they didn’t have rebates on top of them.

If you are interested in getting the very energy efficient houses and receiving the $7,500 energy rebate I would encourage you to act quickly. That money will soon run out.

Send an email or give a call at 232-7900 to find out more about these opportunities.

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Monday Market Memo Feb 3-Feb 9, 2009 February 9th, 2009

Categories: Monday Market Memo

This is the new market memo for the week of Feb 3-Feb 9, 2009. These include all the single family homes listed with the Alaska MLS system this week.

The total inventory increased by 18 this week. It will likely continue to increase as we go into spring and early summer at which time it should level off if this is a typical year.

There were 39 new listings this week. To view the new listings for the week just click on the link at the bottom of this post. This will be a new feature of the Monday Market Memo. I will also include a link to the foreclosed homes on the MLS every week.

The real estate market in Alaska remains relatively healthy in spite of all the doom and gloom coming down from Washington DC. They will say anything to get another trillion dollars to spend.

The truth is that Alaska is an oil enonomy and we are dependent on the income that our state and the oil workers in our state bring in. Without oil, we would be a much smaller state in population. The price of oil is around $40 a barrel. That is not a high enough price to make anyone feel confident.

While other states have a real problem in foreclosures our area hasn’t seen the same level of foreclosures yet. Currently there are only 25 foreclosed homes on the market in our MLS system.
If you would like to see any of these new listings just give Jay or I a call at 907 373-0999.

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Monday Market Memo for Dec 30, 2008 through Jan 5, 2009 January 5th, 2009

Categories: Monday Market Memo

These statistics are for residential single family homes in the whole Matansuska-Susitna Borough.  These include cabins in remote areas of the borough all the way up to million dollar homes.  The vast majority of the real estate activity takes place in the Palmer, Wasilla, Big Lake, and Houston areas.  More than 80% of the action is in those areas.

As expected, our inventory dropped significantly over the end of the year.  I predicted a drop of 50 and was off by only 5, there are 45 fewer listings this week than last.

There were only 3 pendings again this week.  We had only 3 pendings the second week in December as well.  That is an amazingly low number considering the fact that there are 236 real estate licensees in the Mat-Su Borough.

I do expect things to pick up over the next couple months.  That is the normal way of things.  The record-breaking low interest rates will help.  People that have been considering a house purchase should look into locking in these low rates.  Most people are locking in 30 year fixed rates in the mid 4% range. 

If you have a higher interest rate, now is a good time to consider re-financing. 

Better go now, the winds blowing again and I have to batten down the hatches.

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