A Cooler Winter

It is no secret the market has cooled off significantly from last year, and even from the early months of this year. Closings are down nearly 50% year over year. For sellers, this has been a new challenge. Your home is sitting on the market for longer. 200% longer than last year at 30 days average! It is time to exercise patience and get ready to negotiate with your buyers, meaning inspection objections, rate buy-downs, and seller credits. If you won’t, another seller will. Gone are the days of no inspections. 2/3 of homes have dropped prices before selling. Price properly, stage & decorate well.

Sellers are making, on average, a 7.1% or $43K price reduction before going under contract!

Typically we have 1.8 months of inventory on the market in late November. Right now we have closer to 2.2 months. This means that on average, every buyer in the market has 2.2 homes to choose from that would fit all their requirements (compared to 1.8 last year). In Highlands ranch, we have 0.9 months of inventory… so there’s barely 1 home per buyer. And in LoDo, there is 9 months of inventory, so you can have your pick of 9 homes that fit your needs. 6 months of inventory is a true buyers’ market. Colorado as a whole is nowhere near that, but some neighborhoods are.

Buyers - it’s time to find your dream home if you’re motivated. Inventory is soaring. Interest rates have dropped from 8%. You can always refinance, the market always changes.

Thanks to Megan Aller with First American Title for these numbers, as always!