Here’s this week’s report.  While we don’t know for sure if the slowing has occurred because of the elimination of some government sponsored programs as of September 30th, but it sure seems like it.

Weekly Market Activity Report

After spending weeks hypothesizing what role the sunsetting FHA seller-funded downpayment assistance was having in stimulating the recent jump in home sales, we may have our first indication this week. For the week ending October 4—the first week we’ve measured in which the program was unavailable to prospective Twin Cities home buyers—pending sales were ahead of the same week last year by only 3.5 percent. While this is still an upward annual trend, it is about a 15 percent decline in buyer activity as compared to the activity of each of the previous four weeks.

Now that the FHA program is gone, time will tell if home sales will continue to surpass 2006 levels, as seen over the past several weeks. While one week of a relative downturn is too small a sample size to be predictive of the future, our changing financial climate bears close scrutiny in the weeks ahead.

Listing supply continues to draw down, as new listings declined by 12.0 percent for the same time period comparison and the total number of homes for sale is 9.1 percent lower than it was one year ago.

Click here for this week’s full report.

The Twin Cities boards of Realtors published sales for the month of September and transaction activity was up significantly compared to September 2007 which was the beginning of the initial mortgage meltdown.   Home sales were up 42% and prices were down 15.6% to $189,000.  Here’s the Star Tribune story.
We are likely to continue to see this kind of trend – higher comps to last year with lower prices – for quite some time.  And given the latest in the credit crunch, it’s hard to imagine prices turning upward soon.  There are still many foreclosures and distress sales that need to be sold before prices will improve.

The Minneapolis Area Association of Realtors just released the latest sales report.  It’s astounding to be sure.   It will be interesting to see how the numbers come in next week based upon the financial collapse we’re seeing on Wall Street this week.

The September sales party continued for the week ending September 27, as pending sales jumped by a whopping 58.4 percent from 2007. The extravagant nature of these sales increases will not likely continue through the fall, given the current economic uncertainties and an expected downward trend in consumer confidence. New listings also increased for the same time period, bumping up 9.9 percent from the same week last year—the first year-over-year increase in new listings since early July. Total inventory remains significantly down; there are roughly 3,000 fewer homes for sale now than at this time in 2007.

This week’s edition of the MAAR Weekly Market Activity Report features updated figures for several important metrics. The Supply-Demand Ratio (SDR)—a measurement of the number of homes for sale for each buyer—stood at 9.79 for October, down slightly from last October. The Percent of Original List Price Received at Sale dipped slightly to 92.2 percent in September, while the Average Days on Market Until Sale increased to 145, up 2.7 percent from last September.