I went to the Crystal Ball Seminar today at the Texas Station. This is a seminar lead by Larry Murphy who is one of the leading local real estate experts. He created and maintains all the new home inventory and is a statistic guru for Las Vegas. I, along with hundreds of other Realtors from around the city, came to hear about what is going to happen in 2008. Before he spoke about this year, he went in depth about what happened in 2007. Some of the numbers surprised me, and others were pretty evident. So here’s what I learned:
I have read so many articles saying how the market has depreciated 30%-40%. Well according to these numbers, the actual depreciation in Las Vegas was only 4%. That number was calculated by taking an average sale prices of all of the closings in 2007 compared to the average sales prices of 2006 and the number was down by 4%. This was one of those surprising facts until he told us that statistic was only for Single Family Residences. When you started to add condos, condo conversions, and townhouses the number went to 9%. I think the statistic that everyone is thinking about is Volume of sales. Now that number in certain price ranges was down as much as 50%! This is no surprise to anyone who’s been alive in the last year.
The only housing segment that was not affected by our slump in the market has been the properties over $1,000,000. This graph shows the total volume by price. As you can see every other price range has seen a huge decrease in sales which means there are a lot more homes to sell and not as many buyers. An increase in inventory and a decrease in buyers has forced some sellers to come back to real estate reality and lower their prices. Now if someone bought their home in 2005-2006 and you’re trying to sell it right now, you’re probably not going to be able to sell it for what you paid for it. So many sellers are opting to rent out their properties until the market turns around. Being a landlord can be trying at times, but the alternative of letting your home go into foreclosure is not fun! I work with a good Property Management Company if you need a referral.
Now to the good part. We’ve almost hit the bottom of the market. Larry Murphy has predicted that the first and second quarters will see a slight decline and then it will plateau. 2009 should be a much healthier year for real estate, especially with all of the projects opening up on the strip: Wynn Encore(2008) and City Center to name a few. The overwhelming message is :
“It has NEVER been a better time to buy in Las Vegas.”
We haven’t seen prices like these since 2003 or 2002! Interest rates are at historic lows, and the selection is bountiful. If you would like a market analysis, or you would like to see what’s currently on the market, please give me a call at 702-683-2169 or email me at Felipe@felipecrook.com. I look forward to helping you with all your real estate needs.
Felipe Crook
