Here at Golden Real Estate, we are used to having a pretty active real estate market during the winter months, but recent news reports suggested that the market has slowed dramatically, with sellers more reluctant than in the past to put their homes on the market. Statistics show that analysis to be overblown.
Below is a chart showing 6 years of June and November listing activity on REcolorado.com (Denver’s MLS) limited to the City & County of Denver. (Further down I analyze Jefferson County statistics.) December numbers are not available yet, so I’m only showing November activity. It’s not exactly winter, but the trend over 6 years is still useful for the purpose of this analysis.
What the analysis shows is that there was in fact an increase of sales during November over the previous year and nearly as many new listings. The number of active Denver listings in November was less than last year’s peak but still higher than the four previous Novembers. Both median and average days on market were only slightly higher, and the median sold price was much higher than last November. Moreover, the ratio of sold price to listing price was even higher this November than it was in November 2018. As for this month, there have been 384 new listings through Dec. 16th — exactly the same as during the first 16 days of December 2018.
In contrast to Denver and the full MLS, Jefferson County showed a slight slowdown in every metric except the number of sales and the median sales price, as show in these statistics garnered from REcolorado:
While the number of November closings in Jefferson County this year is comparable to previous years, the number of new and active listings this November is markedly lower than last year, and the median and average days on market are markedly higher. Despite the slowdown, the median sold price is higher—a new record for November—but the ratio of sold price to listing price is lower than all five prior years..
As for this month (through last Sunday) we have 257 new listings here in Jeffco, compared to 250 new listings for the same 15 days in December 2018, so that’s unchanged, but almost every agent I’ve spoken to senses a slowdown in real estate activity that is greater than we typically experience at this time of year.
As I’ve written before, winter is, in fact, a good time to sell a home, but it’s true some sellers continue to think otherwise. If a home is not overpriced, it can sell quickly in the winter months for a variety of reasons, the biggest one being that there is less competition from other listings, but there are countless buyers still getting alerts from the MLS, Zillow and other websites when a new listing matches their search criteria. Sellers also appreciate that only serious buyers ask their agents to show homes at this time of year. Lookie-loos are really a fair-weather phenomenon.
Call one of us at 303-302-3636 for a market analysis, including localized winter statistics. By the way, Golden Real Estate, although based in Jefferson County, is also active and successful in the Denver market. Please consider us when it’s time to sell or buy!
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