How Many Expired's?

Logging into MLS early this morning, expecting to see a healthy number of expired listings (as each year many people list through 12/31), I was truly blown away to see 480 expired listings in the last 72 hours! 198 of these were residential homes, and the remainder were a mix of commercial (27), land (290), multi-family listings (11), and a few other misc. listings. I was curious to see if we had ever had a year with a higher number of expired listings, and as was no surprise, we have never come close to 480. In fact, when looking up the residential sector, the most we had ever had at year's end was 100 which happened last year.

So, what does this mean for our inventory scenario, which was presented in our last blog (be sure to read if you haven't yet)? Well, as history has shown, the majority of the 480 sellers will eventually re-list their properties again, but will do so over the next 3 months, contributing to a likely recovery (in this case "recover" is a bad thing) of inventory levels to at least what we were at 4 days ago. You see, many people become dis-illusioned after 2, 3, or even more failed attempts to sell their home. As such, they don't always rush to get it back on the market. In fact, they may not do so again until they come to grips with the fact that in a declining market, with evey passing day, they are loosing more and more money! If you watched our last webcast (again, if you haven't, you really should), you know that some areas experienced as great as 22% depreciation in the last year! That's nearly a 2% loss of equity for every passing month that you aren't able to sell your home in certain areas! So, once this realization is had, most people get more agressive and get their home back on the market. (Please note that we take a firm stance, that if you aren't 100% commited to selling your home at all costs, then you shouldn't list it in the first place, as you are actually negatively impacting the market)

The sad reality is, however, that 2/3 of them still won't sell this time around either. So, what does it take to sell in this market anyway? We'll cover that, in-depth, on Monday! Till then, if you are one of the 480, stop wasting time and give us a call today! (928) 237-1908.