It’s time once again for the monthly reporting roundup, where you can read my wry commentary about the news instead of subjecting yourself to boring rehashes of the NWMLS press release (or in addition to, if that’s what floats your boat).
First up, let’s have a look at the source material from the NWMLS itself. Here’s their press release: Momentum building as home buyers respond to lower prices, favorable financing
Northwest Multiple Listing Service members reported a 43 percent increase in pending sales of single family homes and condominiums during May compared to the same month a year ago.
…
Matt Deasy, the general manager of Windermere Real Estate/East, considers the small differences between year-to-date figures for 2011 and the “tax incentive fueled market” of 2010 to be “good news.”Mike Grady, president and COO of Coldwell Banker Bain, was also upbeat in his comments about the current market. “The substantial jump in pending home sales reported today won’t be surprising to the brokers working in the core urban markets of Seattle and West Bellevue,” observed Grady. He also noted the increasingly strong demand for homes and falling inventory “is making for a very competitive market in those areas, with multiple offers on the best properties becoming more common.”
Nice, I love the cognitive dissonance on display there where they mention last year’s tax credit in reference to the year-to-date figures, then totally ignore it when crowing about the pending sales.
Before we dive into this month’s reports, let’s have another look at the pending sales chart:
Not only does the pending sales count for May 2011 only look good in comparison to the massive dropoff in May 2010, but take a look at how 2011’s thick red line compares to the lines for 2000, 2001, and 2002. Pending sales have been higher in 2011 than all of those years every month, but if you look at the closed sales chart, you’ll see that 2011 is lower than all of those years. Does that look like a recovery to you?
Read on for my take on this month’s local news reports.
Eric Pryne, Seattle Times: Home prices drop again, but pending sales turn upward
Home sales and prices continued to drop in May. But brokers hailed a surge in pending sales — mutually accepted offers that haven’t yet closed — as a sign the Seattle area real-estate market is regaining momentum.
That statistical bump is misleading, another industry observer countered.
Buyers closed on 1,654 houses in King County last month, 6 percent fewer than in May 2010. The median price, $345,000, was nearly 9 percent lower, according to statistics released Monday by the Northwest Multiple Listing Service.
Most of the buzz in industry circles, however, was about the 39 percent year-over-year jump in pending sales — the first such increase of the year.
I spoke with Eric for this piece and am quoted as the “industry observer” making the same basic point I made above. Thanks for taking the time to understand what’s really going on, Eric.
Aubrey Cohen, Seattle P-I: Jump in home sale deals may not last
Local home sale deals surged in May from a year earlier, according to a new report. But that’s mainly because May 2010 was particularly dismal.
Pending sales of houses and condominiums in King County surged 43.5 percent year over year, the Northwest Multiple Listing Service reported. That’s just the second increase in the past year and the biggest since April 2010, when people were rushing to beat an April 30 deadline for a homebuyer tax credit.
But that deadline left ‘precious few people willing to be active and sign contracts in the month of May last year,’ noted Glenn Crellin, director of the Washington Center for Real Estate Research at Washington State University. ‘So we’re comparing (this May) against an artifically low base.’
Nice! Aubrey leads his story off right away with the fact that the “jump” in pending sales is absolutely meaningless. I really enjoy the P-I’s real estate reporting a lot more when they have Aubrey on the beat than when they sub in a sports writer who would miss basic points like this.
Mike Benbow, Everett Herald: Home prices, sales drop in Snohomish County
Home prices in Snohomish County dropped in May more than 15 percent from a year ago, pushing the median price to $230,000, the Northwest Multiple Listing Service reported Monday.
The median, the combined figure for single-family homes and condominiums, is comparable to the county median back in December 2003.
Home sales dropped slightly last month to 820, a 3.76 percent decrease from a year ago.
But pending sales soared to 1,315, a 66.5 percent increase from last year at this time. That’s because homebuyers had rushed to buy in April 2010 to make the deadline for a tax break.
Mike Benbow can sometimes be hit or miss, but he rightly highlights the real story this month. Last year’s massive tax credit dropoff is not somehow a sign of a major recovery this year.
C.R. Roberts, Tacoma News Tribune: Number of pending home sales on rise in region
As the number of pending home sales increases, demand for properties is up as buyers take advantage of lower prices.
Northwest Multiple Listing Service reported Monday that members have reported a 43 percent increase in pending sales of single family homes and condominiums during May, compared with the same month a year ago. The agency represents members in 21 Washington counties. Sellers accepted offers from 7,509 buyers last month, up from the 5,242 a year before.
In Pierce County, MLS members reported 1,579 new listings for residential and condominium properties in May, compared with 1,443 a year ago. More importantly, there were 1,223 pending sales in May, well ahead of the 859 – a 42.3 percent increase – recorded a year ago. Closed sales rose to 796 from 741, a 7.4 percent increase.
More importantly, Mr. Roberts totally misses the real story. Worse, he basically just repeats the same thing for his piece in The Olympian.
C.R. Roberts, The Olympian: Pending home sales on the rise locally and regionally
As the number of pending home sales increases, demand for properties is up as buyers take advantage of lower prices.
Northwest Multiple Listing Service reported Monday that members have reported a 43 percent increase in pending sales of single family homes and condominiums during May, compared with the same month a year ago. The agency represents members in 21 Washington counties. Sellers accepted offers from 7,509 buyers last month, up from the 5,242 a year before.
In Thurston County, members marked 495 new listings, compared with 464 a year before. There were 338 pending sales in Thurston County in May, up nearly 22 percent from 278 sales in 2010. The 255 closed sales in May marked a 1.5 percent decrease from 259 a year before.
Oh well…
But wait, there’s more! It turns out that waiting an extra day to post this paid off with a second story from C.R. Roberts.
C.R. Roberts, Tacoma News Tribune: The story behind pending home sales
I was curious about the jump in pending sales reported yesterday by the Northwest Multiple Listing Service.
Did this signal the turnaround that sellers have been awaiting? Was this the numerical harbinger of better times having arrived?
Cheri Brennan, spokeswoman for Northwest MLS, said that there may be other explanations – beyond a full market rebound – for the increases.
First, she said, “There’s a lot of activity around foreclosures.”And second, there were those incentives that expired a year ago. “The incentives went away, and there was a big dropoff from April to May last year,” Brennan said. “There was that big push to buy before the deadline hit.”
Well that’s better than what we got on Tuesday, but still a bit lame. Just a couple quotes from agents and no real analysis. In addition to the portion quoted above, he also spoke with a second NWMLS-approved agent who fed him some garbage about “the state of the market and the state of mind that buyers are bringing to the marketplace.”
(Eric Pryne, Seattle Times, 06.06.2011)
(Aubrey Cohen, Seattle P-I, 06.06.2011)
(Mike Benbow, Everett Herald, 06.07.2011)
(C.R. Roberts, Tacoma News Tribune, 06.07.2011)
(C.R. Roberts, The Olympian, 06.06.2011)
(C.R. Roberts, Tacoma News Tribune, 06.08.2011)