Alameda Inventory: 31-Percent Growth Over Last Year

Alameda home inventory has been steadily growing since the beginning of the year, when the Island was well below a 100 units of housing for sale. Over the past eight months inventory seem to be stuck in the 130 range, but began to grow again and with the end of the Federal tax credit, and the traditional selling season.

Since both of those milestones have passed it is good to reflect back and see how the market has changed.

Enter the Fall of 2009, there was a downward trend in inventory after peaking in July and bottoming at 131 units during the first week of September. The lack of inventory continued well into 2010 and lag for most of the year.

Inventory is now at 185 units, this is a growth of of 31-percent from September 2009. The largest growth came in the condominium market that more than doubled. The condo market has struggled over the past two years as evident with 11 condos listed at $250,000 or below. Three of those units are in the Park Webster complex at the foot of Webster Street. The Woodstock Coop (townhouse) also has two listed under the $250,000.

The distressed market has also grown over the past year. The most concerning is the growth of Short Sales. Short Sales is the seller's attempt to sell the home for less than they owe on the property. The number of short sales double from the prior year. The properties range from $149,888 to $720,000.

Date: Septemer 6, 2010 Sep-10 Sep-09 Change Total Inventory 185 131 54 94501 140 104 36 94502 45 27 18 Single Family 99 86 13 Condos 55 26 29 Multi-Family 29 17 12 Foreclosure 17 12 5 Short Sale 21 10 11 Price Reduced 72 47 25 % of Price Reduced 38.92% 35.88% 3.04% High List  $1,835,000  $1,899,000 Low List  $149,888  $204,900

Note: The inventory includes to parcels of land for sale. 

Alameda Real Estate: Odds, Ends and Inventory

Just a quick post today. The Alameda home inventory is down from the prior two weeks, and if you look at the chart below you can see the steep decline since July. If this was a ski slope it would be a lots of fun, but this line just makes the market sluggish.



The market add three new foreclosures this past week and you can see that distressed properties make up almost 30 percent of the Island's inventory. Distressed properties have made up 25 percent of the market since November. I think that this trend is going to continue most of this year.




The inventory for week shows that single family residence are still below 60 units. Of the 56 units for sale 16 of those properties are either a short sale or foreclosure; this is 29 percent of the inventory. If you are looking on Bay Farm the inventory 25 units, so buyers do not have much selection.

I would expect a bit of a sales run as the Federal Tax Credit comes to a close in April (buyers need to be in contract by April 30, 2010) on lower end properties that would fit the income limits for buyers. Until the market gains new inventory prices will be low and sales will be slow.

Alameda Inventory: February 12, 2010

. . 2/15/2010 . Total 109 . 94501 84 . 94502 25 . SFR 56 . Condo 32 . Multi-Family 19 . Short Sale 18 . Foreclosure 14 . Price Reductions 32 . High List $1,999,000 . Low List $199,900 .

Increase in Single Family Homes For Sale

This week the Alameda Real Estate Inventory showed a niced increase with an additional nine units for sale. The increase in Single Family Residences was the most positive part of the increase in inventory.

The SFR market was below 60 units for the past seven weeks, so any bump even a small one is encouraging. Since most of the Island's housing stock is SFRs then an increase in this category is good for the current market, which has been suffering from a lack of inventory. There are 11 news single family listing since last Monday.

New Listings

. List Date List Price Adress Beds Baths Sq Feet Type . 2/5/2010 $648,000 336 LINA AVENUE 4 3.5 3150 SFR . 2/5/2010 $549,000 2015 BUENA VISTA AVENUE 2 1 1318 SFR . 2/5/2010 $619,900 404 KITTY HAWK RD 3 2 1438 SFR . 2/5/2010 $430,000 3116 LA CRESTA 3 2.5 1628 TNHS . 2/4/2010 $450,000 2017 LINCOLN AVENUE 3 2.5 1443 SFR . 2/4/2010 $639,000 404 CAMDEN RD 3 2 1503 SFR . 2/4/2010 $698,000 227 INVERNESS CT 3 2.5 1891 SFR . 2/3/2010 $565,000 7 KINGSBURY COURT 2 3.5 1503 CONDO . 2/3/2010 $470,000 3037 LINDA VI 3 2.5 1628 TNHS . 2/2/2010 $354,900 1819 UNION ST 2 1 997 SFR . 2/1/2010 $250,000 1825 SHORELINE DR #112 1 1 621 CONDO . 2/1/2010 $517,000 1618 6TH ST 2 2 1422 SFR . 2/1/2010 $310,000 447 LINCOLN AVE 2 1 722 SFR . 2/1/2010 $1,300,000 2809 SEA VIEW PKWY 5 3 2744 SFR . 2/1/2010 $779,000 105 SHEFFIELD RD 4 2 1954 SFR

Overall, Inventory still remains low, but relative to the the current sales levels it may be an appropriate level of housing stock until more buyers come to the market. This is the proverbial chicken and egg; in this case buyer and seller. More people will sell when they have people to buy and buyers will buy when there is something that fits their needs to buy.

A shift needs to happen to shake the market loose, but until then I will just continue to monitor the numbers.

Alameda Inventory February 8, 2010

. . 2/8/2010 . Total 113 . 94501 89 . 94502 24 . SFR 61 . Condo 31 . Multi-Family 19 . Short Sale 18 . Foreclosure 11 . Price Reductions 29 . High List $1,999,000 . Low List $188,000 .

Alameda Landmark Now A Short Sale

Sorry about the lack of posts last week, but have been under the weather and did not feel much like writing.

Here is today's home inventory for Alameda and the data shows a nice upswing in inventory this week. In total the Island is up 11 more units than last week, but there is a concerning underlying element in the numbers that is cause for concern.

Five of the 11 units for sale are distressed properties; our of the properties are short sales. If this trend holds it is a sign that people are continuing to struggle with their mortgages and can not hold on at the current rate.

Three of the four short sale listings add this week were townhome/condos. The only exception is The Webster House at 1238 Versailles Avenue. Built in 1854 this is a City landmark and now a victim of the housing downturn. According to the listing comment it is a: Historical gem currently used as a bed & breakfast & tea house (business being sold separately). Fully remodeled w/ commercial kitchen & charming touches throughout. Large grounds, set far back from the street w/ great curb appeal.

Distressed properties are 35 percent of Alameda's inventory. Inventory growth is a good thing given the City has less than three months of it, but at the cost of others losing their property this can have other social impact.

Alameda Inventory -- February 1, 2010

. . 2/1/2010 . Total 104 . 94501 82 . 94502 22 . SFR 54 . Condo 29 . Multi-Family 19 . Short Sale 19 . Foreclosure 10 . Price Reductions 28 . High List $1,999,000 . Low List $188,000 .

Alameda Housing Stock Falls Below 100 Units

I am on vacation this week, but I did want to make a quick post with the weekly Alameda MLS homes for sale inventory data. It was significant that the inventory fell below 100 units to start 2010.

The graph that goes back to November 2008 shows a steady increase from February 2009 to July of last year. From July it has been a steady decline reaching an all time low since I started tracking the data.

The Island has just 56 single family homes for sale and just 27 under $600,000. Of those 27 on 15 have three or more bedrooms listed. That is a very limited selection for home hunters.

Short sales and foreclosures continue to make up a good portion of the Alameda inventory for sale; distressed properties are 38 percent of the inventory.

If you compare the first week of 2009 to 2010 the Island had 149 units for sale compared to the new low of 97. This is a 34 percent decline year-over-year.

I will try and get one more post in this week, but next Monday I will have December 2009 sales and Thursday the results of 2009.






Alameda Home Inventory January 4, 2010

. . 1/4/2010 . Total 97 . 94501 80 . 94502 17 . SFR 56 . Condo 19 . Multi-Family 20 . Short Sale 18 . Foreclosure 12 . Price Reductions 33 . High List $1,999,000 . Low List $215,000 .

Inventory Fall To Near 100 Units

I hope that everyone had a nice Christmas Holiday, I took the time to relax and not think about Alameda Real Estate, but is now Monday and back to work and back to the blog.

Alameda inventory continues to fall and has come oh so close to falling below a 100 units. As of today, the inventory stands at 102 units. If you compare this to last year, December 29, the Island had 157 units for sale; a decline of 35 percent.

Because inventory continues to decline, the properties that remain, are those that are more difficult to sell. Thirty seven of the properties have been on the market more than 90 days and of the current listings 24 properties were listed in December. The number of distressed properties continues to dominate the inventory.

This week, 37 percent of the inventory was a distressed property. You can see in the chart, that as inventory declines the percent of distressed increased over the past four weeks.

For those searching for a single family residence the choices are becoming very slim with just 56 homes for sale. If you are looking in the 94502, Bay Farm has just 10 homes available for sale.

It appears that investors are trying to sell multi-family buildings with 24 units now available. Seven of those properties, 29 percent, are distressed properties.

So as we gear up for the New Year and New Decade, I expect that the inventory numbers will begin to climb. It will be important to see how single family residence enter the market and how they are valued by buyers. If the market is changing, then this is the segment that we best to gauge how strong the housing recovery is for Alameda.

Alameda Real Estate Inventory

. . 12/28/2009 . Total 102 . 94501 84 . 94502 18 . SFR 56 . Condo 20 . Multi-Family 24 . Short Sale 19 . Foreclosure 12 . Price Reductions 35 . High List $1,999,000 . Low List $129,000 .

Alameda Inventory Still in Decline

I think the chart says it all, the inventory for homes for sale in Alameda continues to fall. Part is due to the seasonality, part due to an unsure real estate market.

Single family residences fell to under 60 units for the first time this year. Bay Farm (94502) has just 19 units for sale. There are 31 distressed properties for sale making up 30 percent of the inventory.

Short week, short post.



Alameda Inventory Data

. . 12/21/2009 . Total 105 . 94501 86 . 94502 19 . SFR 59 . Condo 19 . Multi-Family 25 . Short Sale 18 . Foreclosure 13 . Price Reductions 37 . High List $1,899,000 . Low List $129,000 .

First Week of December Okay for Alameda Home Sales

With the first week of December already over, just 17 shopping days left for those celebrating Christmas, I wanted to monitor the Alameda sales carefully as we close out the year. The market loses about seven day in the month between the 24th and the 31st for home sales. A few homes will sell and close during the period but for the most part any sale in Alameda has will come in the first 20 days.

The month already has seven home sales recorded for December and at that is a good pace to beat last years sales for the final month of the year. In December 2008, the Island saw just 21 sales and finished the year with 444 sales. Through the first 11 months of 2009, Alameda now has 414 sales and is now just 23 sales short of matching last year. This is amazing since sales were pacing far behind in June, the second of the year proved to be better for sales.

Two of the sales recorded in the first week were short sales. A townhouse at 1028 Marianas, Bay Farm, sold for 84 percent of the asking price. The other short sale received 96 percent of it asking price and sold for $400,000 and according to Zillow, 2524 Buena Vista last sold October 2007 for $770,000. That is a $370,000 loss.

Here are the rest of the sales for the week. Weekly inventory data is below the sales.

. Sale Date Address Zip Type Beds Baths Sq Feet List Price Sale Price % Distressed . 12/1/2009 1028 MARIANAS LN 94502 TWN HSE 4 2 1766 $499000 $420000 84% Short Sale . 12/1/2009 2524 BUENA VISTA 94501 SFR 4 3 1761 $415000 $400000 96% Short Sale . 12/1/2009 1401 SANTA CLARA 94501 SFR 2 1 1316 $567000 $530000 93% . 12/1/2009 1132 FOUNTAIN ST 94501 SFR 2 1 1195 $499000 $555000 111% . 12/3/2009 1831 HARVARD DR 94501 SFR 4 2 1604 $725000 $699000 96% . 12/2/2009 210 SHEFFIELD RD 94502 SFR 4 2 2256 $849000 $845000 100% . 12/2/2009 1304 MORTON ST 94501 SFR 3 2 2064 $949999 $938000 99%

Weekly Alameda Inventory Data

. . 12/7/2009 . Total 113 . 94501 93 . 94502 20 . SFR 65 . Condo 22 . Multi-Family 24 . Short Sale 19 . Foreclosure 13 . Price Reductions 43 . High List $1,799,000 . Low List $149,000 .

Looking at Alameda Housing Compared to the Region

Seeing that inventory has dropped in Alameda over the past several weeks I thought it was important to show how the region is performing over the past several months.

The SF Bay Area has seen a drop every month for the past 12 months. In November of 2008 the region had 30,668 homes for sale a year later the inventory has fallen to below 15,000 units. It is almost a 28 percent drop in 12 months. From October to November of this year, inventory dropped 2.42 percent for the Bay Area.

There are several reasons for this drop in inventory the first is distressed properties are starting to clear out in many cities. Second is people are waiting to sell if they can and waiting to see what the market is going to do in the next 12-18 months. Finally we have also hit the slow season for home sales.

Almost 45 percent of properties in the Bay Area on the market have used a price reduction to try and stimulate sales on properties that are lagging to produce interest.

In Alameda, we currently have 41 percent of our inventory instituting a price reduction. A good example is in the over million dollar market for Alameda we have 10 properties listed. On Bay Farm, 7 Castlebar is Alameda highest listing at $1,899,000. it is also listed for $1,699,000. It has been on the market since May even with the apparent price reduction.

The other issue is properties that are not selling. Overpriced properties and distressed are making a large portion of properties currently for sale. Overpriced is hard to define, but days on market is a good indicator. Over 50 properties have been on the market more than 60 days. Alameda’s distressed property is 18 percent of the inventory.

The Alameda market is following the region for the most part in terms of price reductions and declining inventory.

If you look at sales in the Bay Area for September and October they have been very strong compared to the first part of the year and this has cleared out much of the inventory. The thing to watch is if we start seeing fewer sales and glut of distressed properties, then the slow market will continue.

Holiday Shopping Has Little Inventory

Hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving Holiday. It has been a crazy month and I have been a little scattered in posting the past three weeks. During that time I forgot that 94501 Real Estate just celebrated one year of publishing blog posts about Alameda Real Estate. I hope that I have another year in me, I had no idea what I was getting into what I started, but it has been tremendous fun.

So on to the Alameda Real Estate news. It is Monday and it is time to update inventory. The Alameda Inventory has been decreasing since mid-July and has bottomed this week to a record low since I started tracking the data a year ago. The Island has 111 units for sale; 67 of the units are single family residence.

. . 11/30/2009 . Total 113 . 94501 92 . 94502 21 . SFR 67 . Condo 21 . Multi-Family 23 . Short Sale 21 . Foreclosure 14 . Price Reductions 45 . High List $1,899,000 . Low List $149,000 .

Part of the reason for the low inventory is strong sales in September and October. Add in seasonality, winter is a slow selling season and we now have very little inventory.

So far, November is looking to be a slow month compared to last year. Early numbers show 25 sales so far for the month and unless we have a strong weekend of closings over the holiday weekend this will fall short of 2008’s 32 sales. So those units that are for sale right now are those that need to be sold.

As evidence of this, five properties were placed on the market during the Thanksgiving weekend; three of those properties were distressed. The new distressed properties are: two bedrooms, two bath foreclosed property at 343 Laguna Vista for $474,900, a three bedroom two and half bath foreclosed home at 801 Park Street for $539,500 and a short sale multi-family duplex (two units) at 1550 8th street for $350,000.



It looks as if the December will be slow in terms of transactions unless more homes come on the market.

Just one other item: A National story that has local impact in terms of homeowners that are struggling to hold on with their current home loan. Today the Obama administration said it will crack down on mortgage companies that are failing to do enough to help borrowers at risk of foreclosure. The Treasury Department said it will withhold payments from mortgage companies that aren't working with borrowers to make loan modifications permanent.

According to the Mortgage Bankers Association, about 14% of homeowners with mortgages were either behind on payments or in foreclosure at the end of September. This is at a record level for the ninth straight quarter.

A new group of homeowners now seem to be at threat of losing their home. A Congressional Oversight Panel reported last month that foreclosures are now threatening borrowers who took out conventional, fixed-rate mortgages and put down payments of 10% to 20% on homes that would have been within their means in a normal market. This is something to watch in the coming months.

Alameda Inventory Continues to Stay Flat

I have not been posting the past few days because I have been attending the National Association of Realtors Expo in San Diego. Today is the final day of the gathering and I will be heading back home later today.

It has been good to get the pulse of those who work in the industry everyday, but the jammed pack days have kept me away from my duties of keeping up with our local market.

Over the past nine weeks inventory has been flat ranging between 122 and 135 units for sale. This week inventory stayed in this range at 125 units, but there was a visible increase in distressed properties. In terms of total inventory distressed properties account for 37 percent of the unit, this was a four percent increase from the prior week.


Link to Larger Chart

The raw numbers are not huge with four new foreclosures and on additional short sale added to the market over the past week. Looking at data from RealtyTrac it hows that the island has 101 properties in pre-foreclosure, 64 ready for auction and 84 banked owned. That 84 number is the one that concerns me, not knowing when or if these will be release into the market could add pressure to an already fragile market.

Below is the inventory for the week.

. . 11/16/2009 . Total 125 . 94501 98 . 94502 27 . SFR 75 . Condo 27 . Multi-Family 21 . Short Sale 21 . Foreclosure 15 . Price Reductions 46 . High List $1,899,000 . Low List $149,000 .