The Minneapolis Area Association of Realtors just released the latest weekly report. The headline number this week is that pending sales were only 6.9% behind last year’s pace. Typically that number has been between 15-25% each week. It will be interesting to see if this trend continues throughout the spring. In my opinion, the pending sales number is the most important data point if there were just one data point we needed to watch.
Here is the note from the association:
Potential home buyers waiting for even more new inventory to hit the market may be waiting a long time. For the week ending March 15, there were almost 300 fewer properties put on the market in the Twin Cities than during the same week in 2007—a decline of 12.0 percent. And the number of new listings on the market in the last three months is 6.9 percent behind the same time one year ago. So while total inventory remains high, the frenzied peak of seller activity appears to be behind us.
The number of newly signed purchase agreements jumped significantly from the previous week; and for the same time period comparison last year was down only 8.9 percent. While this is a positive indication that buyers may be beginning to recognize the tremendous opportunities available, we are by no means out of the woods yet. Let’s at least hope we’re out of the snow.