Alameda Inventory Down and Points to Good Signs

I have been writing the 94501 Real Estate blog for 45 weeks now, and the one consistent topic I cover is inventory. Inventory is gives us a good understanding of the Alameda market and how homes are selling.

Over the past three months the inventory has been sucked up and we have reached a 45 week low of 122 units. This is 32 percent decline in 10 weeks. Normally low inventory means a price will begin to rise A preliminary look at September sales shows that this may be the fact.




With three days left in the month September has already recorded 41 sales a big increase from the same time last year. The number that caught my eye was the increase in both median and average home sale price. The current September median is $568,000 a 12 percent increase over August's $505,500 and a 4 percent year-over-year increase.

The Average sale price saw a 6 percent increase from August and a 5 percent decline from September 2008.

Alameda now has just 79 single family residences and 22 condos for sales. A look at sales bands shows that homes are divided fairly evenly:

Under $500,000 -- 34 units
$500,000 to $700,000 -- 36 units
$700,001 to $999,999 -- 37 units
$1,000,000 or more -- 15 units

The lowest priced property on the market jumped this week $40,000 to $269,000. This is the highest of the low has been since tracking inventory. It appears that the low end is being snapped up by buyers.

Homes that are using price reductions to sell are also declining in proportion to inventory. The homes with price reductions range between 34 percent and 42 percent since the beginning of the year.

Most of this is good news: homes selling, median price stabilizing and evenly distributed inventory. I am not sure that the Alameda housing market has turned around, but all the signs in September show a positive step towards recovery. The only thing that needs to be monitored is the distressed market, if a glut of homes hit the market in the next several months this could erase the positives.

Weekly Inventory Data

. . 9/28/2009 . Total 122 . 94501 100 . 94502 22 . SFR 79 . Condo 22 . Multi-Family 19 . Short Sale 10 . Foreclosure 13 . Price Reductions 43 . High List $1,899,000 . Low List $269,000 . .