As with politics, “all real estate is local.” News reports about the national real estate market going up, down or sideways may or may not apply to where you live. I don’t have the space to provide the stats for your subdivision, but I can certainly provide them for Denver and for the metro area using data from REcolorado, our MLS.
The charts below contain what I consider to be the most useful statistics for assessing the health of the real estate market in the City & County of Denver compared to the rest of the metro area, which I’m defining as within a 17-mile radius of the state capitol. That radius includes Aurora but not Parker on the east and southeast, Highlands Ranch but not Castle Rock to the south, Golden to the west, and Broomfield and Thornton but not Brighton or Boulder to the north. Basically, it includes most of what I consider urban and suburban Denver.
What we learn from these statistics covering the last five years is that the median sales price has continued to rise by a significant amount every year, both in Denver and the rest of the metro area. The same was true for the price per square foot except for a slight dip between 2017 and 2018 in Denver (and, by the way, in Jeffco) but not for the rest of the metro area as a whole.
The ratio of selling price to listing price has been on a steady decline in both charts, but the drop in 2019 was much sharper, sinking below full price. Meanwhile, the median days that it took listings to go under contract was pretty steady until 2019, when it surged by over 50% both in Denver and the rest of the metro area. The number of sold listings has remained steady for all five years, but notice the surge in expired (unsold) listings in both 2018 and 2019.
Now let’s look at how this December in Denver compared to previous Decembers:
In that chart you see that there has been an improvement over past years in every indicator except days on market and the number of listings that expired without selling. Median sold price and price per square foot are at record highs for December. The ratio of sold price to listing price is slightly higher than in 2018, although still under listing price. It will be interesting to see how January shapes up. As I write this on Monday evening, there have already been 125 closings of Denver listings and there were only 907 Denver listings under contract, so it’s not looking good for matching last January’s number of 1,665 sold listings.
Now, let’s look at the same analysis for Jefferson County’s real estate market.
What we learn from these statistics covering the last five years is that the median sales price has continued to rise by a significant amount every year, both in Jeffco and the rest of the metro area. The same was true for the price per square foot except for a decline between 2017 and 2018 in Jeffco, as in Denver, but not for the rest of the metro area as a whole.
The ratio of selling price to listing price has been on a steady decline in both charts, but the drop in 2019 was much sharper, sinking below full price. Meanwhile, the median days that it took listings to go under contract was pretty steady until 2019, when it surged by about 50% both in Jeffco and the rest of the metro area. The number of sold listings has remained steady for all five years, but notice the surge in expired (unsold) listings in both 2018 and 2019.
Now let’s look at how this December in Jefferson County compared to previous Decembers:
In that chart you see that there has been an improvement over past years in every indicator, including a drop in the number of listings that expired without selling. Median sold price and price per square foot are at record highs for December. The ratio of sold price to listing price is slightly higher than in 2018, although still under listing price. It will be interesting to see how January shapes up. As I write this on Monday evening, there have already been 93 closings of Jeffco listings and there were 549 Jeffco listings under contract, so it’s looking pretty certain that we’ll beat January 2018’s number of 553 sold listings.
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