Pinellas Real Estate Sales as of August 2008, The Good, Bad and The Ugly

Do you want to know what’s really happening with Pinellas Real Estate?  Want to avoid the sugar-coated smooth talk and just want honest answers?

Suncoast Partners and The Pinellas Peach take pride in providing meaningful knowledge, insight and data to assist you with making informed Pinellas real estate investment decisions.  Above is our first monthly installment of data that’s seemingly too difficult for the educated Pinellas real estate consumer to find these days.

PRO, The Pinellas Board of Realtors, dispenses boat loads of data each month.  Some meaningful and some, quite frankly, will put even the most analytical types to sleep.  ZZZzzzzzzz. We’ve assembled the parts we believe are important, but we need you to please let us know what you like, don’t like, and what data, if any, you would like to see that’s not here.

This data shows us that for Pinellas home SELLERS (reverse this if you’re buying or buying up):

The Good :

1. Just as many homes are selling this year as last year.
2. The number of homes on the market has declined slightly, which is good news for everybody because it’s an indicator that we’ve got fewer non-serious sellers.
3. Our MSI (Month’s Supply of Inventory) numbers are down significantly for single family homes and down slightly for condos – a healthy sign toward market correction.
4. In August we saw the lowest ‘Days on Market’ numbers we’ve seen in months.  Homes are selling more quickly than they were earlier in the year.

The Bad:

1. Prices are down significantly from last year – roughly 14% for single family homes and 22% for condos.  Keep in mind this is just a snapshot for the past two months over last year.  The thing I hate about statistics is that one can slice them and dice them to suit just about any purpose, but know that the numbers being bantered about by those in the know is that Pinellas home prices have come down about 16% in the last year.
2. Prices are still declining as the Palm Harbor foreclosures and Dunedin Short Sales continue to pop up.  (The rate at which that is happening and what we expect to happen is subject matter for another post). 
3. These low interest rates aren’t going to last forever (they were already up again to between 6.5% and 6.75% today), so it’s going to continue to get harder and harder to find qualified buyers to buy your Ozona FL home.  If you’re considering a purchase, it’s time to get your game shoes on (yet another subject for another post).

The Ugly:

Tricked ya!  Happy Halloween!  There’s nothing ugly about real estate as long-term investment, a great tax write-off, and most importantly, a place to call home sweet home.

Remember, tell us what you think.  Your opinion matters!

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