Portland Maine Real Estate – August 2010

Bad news really does travel fast, especially as it pertains to the economy in generally and real estate in particular.  As everyone reported last month, us included, home sales fell in July – and the drop was pretty dramatic.

However, what gets lost is that 2010 sales results are better, year-to-date, than they were in 2009.  Although this may not be true in all Maine towns and cities, the following is information as it pertains to Portland Maine real estate, focusing on single family home sales.

In 2009 through August 31^st there were 264 homes sold at a median price of $217,625.  The median days on market was 46, the percentage of selling price vs list price was 96% and the median price per square foot was $141.30.

Now jump ahead to 2010 and look at the year-to-date sales results through August 31^st. A total of 286 homes have been sold, representing an increase of 8.3%.  The median selling price was $220,500, again reflecting an increase – although a modest one – of 1.3%.  The median days on market was 39 and the percentage of selling price vs list price was 97%.

Current Inventory

At this time, however, there are a lot of homes on the market, thus making the competition for each sale very intense.  The median listing price is $275,000, which does appear to be a bit high compared to what has sold this year and last year.  However, this price might be skewed somewhat by an unusually larger inventory of waterfront properties currently on the market.  Yet, the numbers are what they are.

Thoughts on the Market

It will be important to see what happens over the next few months, and whether July’s results were an aberration or the beginning of a new trend.  I think everyone expected to see a sales drop once the tax incentive worked its way through the system and was completed.

When it comes to homes sales in Portland another key thing to keep in mind is that comparisons to 2009 reflect increases from a very poor year in real estate.

In coming posts we will update sales results for other surrounding towns and will have our third quarter YTD comparisons done as soon as information is available from MREIS, our source for this data.