Coldwell Banker Weekly Market Watch

Coldwell Banker Weekly Market Watch
January 29-February 4, 2007

Last weekend’s Super Bowl seemed to have little or no impact on the more than 350 Open Homes our agents provided throughout the San Francisco Bay region. Reports of 148 attendees on a North Bay listing, and over 300 for the weekend at a Menlo Park Open House were not met with surprise. In densely populated areas such as San Francisco’s Noe Valley, it was back to the old days of cars double parked up and down the narrow streets as Buyers scrambled to see the few new listings introduced to the market this past week.

It’s perfectly clear that what’s “not right” with this current market is not enough inventory. We are hearing the same lament in all our offices – from Palo Alto in the South to the Marina District of San Francisco in the North. It appears our offices in North Bay and East Bay share the same concerns. Of the offices that reported declining sales this week, it seems they are the same offices reporting decreasing inventory. You can’t sell it if you don’t have it.

Multiple offers are ruling the day again. Consider our Woodside office, perhaps harder hit in the “adjusting” market of 2006 due to the price point of their inventory. This week they reported 8 sales, of which 50% were in multiple offers. Six months ago it seemed Woodside was very far away from multiple offers being the norm again anytime soon. Burlingame reported multiple offers this week from the $700K price point to a recent listing they introduced at $3M. San Francisco agents are back to asking what the “offer date” is of a new listing, where it’s plain to see that nearly 50% of all sales are going into multiple offers in the City. It’s too soon to see if this is a “blip” or a trend – but in the meanwhile, the best Valentine’s present any Bay Area homebuyer could receive would be for more Sellers to get their homes on the market.

Rick Turley
President

Coldwell Banker Weekly Market Watch
January 22-28, 2007


A hunger for inventory seems pervasive in the majority of markets. In most areas inventory is getting sold as fast as it comes on the market. The Peninsula and San Francisco offices report the most frenzied buyer activity and the lowest inventory. A number of agents in San Francisco are back to setting offer dates.

Eager buyers are out in all price ranges and for all types of property, from first time homes to luxury homes. But those buyers are awaiting new listings and selection before sealing the deal. There also seems to be a resurgence of people looking for second home and vacation property, especially up in Sonoma County.

The activity level in the offices has picked up significantly in the last week with 11 offices reporting increasing sales activity. 16 offices report steady sales activity, and 3 of the offices reported declining sales activity.

Multiple offers continued to pick up this week with more than 60 properties receiving two or more offers, as reported by the offices. Some of the listings experiencing multiple offers are still looking at prices at or even slightly under list price – still a good opportunity for Buyers. Many other listings are seeing prices well over asking price, more similar to 2005 and earlier.

In some cases, any “perceived” losses thought to have occurred in 2006, could possibly be turned around within the first two quarters of 2007. Let’s hope potential Sellers see this opportunity and bring more inventory to the market.

Listing inventory is reported as increasing by 9 offices, steady by 17 offices, and decreasing at 4 offices. There were over 480 open houses held and they continue to remain well attended across the board.

Hope your team won yesterday!


Rick Turley
President, San Francisco Peninsula