[UPDATE: June 17, 2010 - The AP is reporting the extension has been approved.]

There are times in life when you are instructed to hurry up. You do, and then you find you must wait. That is happening in the lives of many home buyers who met the April 30th deadline for the federal home buyers tax credit. Many folks endured the dash to find, negotiate purchase terms and seal deal by the required date and, with all intentions of meeting the second criteria – close on the sale no later than June 30th – have found it very difficult to do so.

The reason for the problem is simply that there are a great many people all trying to close at the same time.

So there is a proposal in Congress to extend the deadline until September 30th. It’s a good idea.

There is more to getting a property closed than meeting at the attorney’s office and arranging for movers.

There are home inspections, pest inspections, loan applications, title searches, nervous breakdowns. And all these have to be scheduled, performed, reviewed and sometimes new negotiations entered into. Whereas I can have a nervous breakdown with a moment’s notice, other things take time.

So, I say, give it to the nice people who are scrambling to do what they were encouraged to do.

Tags: AP, home buyers tax credit, proposal to extend tax credit approved, Senate

…things look better the last 2 weeks than the previous, oh, the previous one million or so. Or at least the previous 10.

There were 10 new foreclosure listings the week ending June 6th, 2010, spread over 6 of Greensboro’s 9 residential zip codes. Still too many, and that’s 10 homeowners in a bad way. But it’s a relief to see the lower number. And it’s the second lowest in thepast 17 weeks.

Slowly – very slowly – we’re beginning to hear news stories reporting what we all want to hear, namely, that the tide may be turning. Or at least slowing down. Here’s one such story.

Not only that, when comparing the 12-week rolling period ending last Friday, there’s a decided drop in the number. The graph looks like a schematic for the “Thunder Road” roller coaster at Carowinds. The 12-week totals have been in the 180′s or nearly there since March but the last 2 weeks have shown a decline from the high of 186 and this most recent week the number fell all the way to 169. February 28th is the last time it was this low.

Again, some Greensboro zip codes are more impacted by foreclosure listings than others. This week 27405 and 27407 have half the listings between them, with 2 & 3, respectively.

Over the last 12 weeks, those two zip codes plus 27406 account for 59% of the total listings.

Just for good measure, I’ll add that the number of foreclosures listed this week are actually fewer than this same week last year.

The 12-week total is still higher this week than the same period last year, but the news is encouraging on balance. And we’ll take it, right?

We’ll see what next week brings us. There’s still too much inventory of all types, and certainly too many foreclosure listings. But The fewer distressed sales – and distressed sellers – there are, the better for all sellers and for the community.

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If you have questions, comments or a good joke to share shoot me an email.  I’m a full time Realtor®, I love what I do and would be thrilled to hear from you.

* All data from Triad Multiple Listing Service (MLS) and is only as good as the information entered, which is done by humans, who make errors. The information is only for those residential zip codes for Greensboro and does not include the surrounding communities.

Tags: Carowinds, NPR.org, Thunder Road roller coaster

• The average currently listed price of single family homes is $148,178, compared to that of all Greensboro zip codes, $249,784.

• 27406 is probably the largest zip area-wise and has the seconds most listings: 458 which represents 15% of the total listings in town at this time. 27410 is still king of the hill in that area with a whopping 622.

Current Listing Data (followed by same info for al zip codes combined)

• average active listing price (all property types): $146,510 ($223,107)

• single-family: 419 (91%), 2445 (74%)
• townhouses: 29 (6%), 482 (29%)
• condominium: 10 (2%), 357 (11%)

• foreclosure: 72 (16%) 264 (8%)

• highest list price (single-family): $899,000 ($4,900,00)
• lowest list price (single-family): $12,000 ($6,000)

12 Month Sales Data

Over the last 12 months, sales in the 27406 zip have looked like this:

• total number of closings (all property types): 418 (2,855)

• average closed priced (all types, last 12 months): $121,283 ($167,604)
• average list price (all property types): $146,510 ($160,356)
• average list/closed price percentage: 96% (96%)

• single-family: 295 (59%) 2,210 (77%)
• townhouse: 132 (27%) 386 (14%)
• condominium: 70 (14%) 245 (9%)

• foreclosure: 137 (33%) 565 (20%)

• highest closed price (single-family): $366,500 ($1,200,000)
• lowest closed price (single-family): $5,000 ($5,000)

Schools

Some of the schools children who live in 27406 attend are:

• Elementary: Alamance, Archer, Foust, Frazier, Gillespie Park, Lindley, Pleasant Garden, Sedalia, Southern, Sumner, Vandalia, Washington, Wiley
• Middle: Allen, Eastern, Hairston, Jackson, Kiser, Southeast, Southern
• High: Dudley, Eastern, Grimsley, Smith, Southeast, Southern

Some 27406 Listings

For your viewing pleasure….

3731 Williams Dairy Road (MLS# 570183) $239,900

5677 Old Randleman Rd (MLS# 565355) $279,500

1107 Glynis Lane (MLS# 576949)

331 Steeple Chase (MLS# 579043)

Keep an eye on this site for updates about this zip code and others.

As always, whether the news is good or bad, you’ll see it here.

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If you have questions, comments or a good joke to share shoot me an email.  I’m a full time Realtor®, I love what I do and would be thrilled to hear from you.

* All data from Triad Multiple Listing Service (MLS) and is only as good as the information entered, which is done by humans, who make errors. The information is only for those residential zip codes for Greensboro and does not include the surrounding communities.

Tags: 1107 Glynis Lane, 27406, 27410, 331 Steeple Chase, 3731 Williams Dairy Rd, 5677 Old Randleman Rd, Greensboro, Greensboro housing statistics, Greensboro real estate, Greensboro zip codes, Guilford County Schools, listingbook.com, MLS, MLS# 565355, MLS#570183, MLS#576949, MLS#579043, Multiple List, Multiple Listing Service, PTI, Triad MLS, US Census Bureau demographic information

Of all the things that impact the housing market in any region, inventory may be the most important. The number of properties available for sale is what drives a market being dubbed “buyer’s” or “seller’s”. As with any other commodity, if there is much more on the shelves than buyers in the aisles, prices are impacted.

Unlike the price of apples, though, when a community has too much housing inventory, the impact can be widely felt. After all, properties whose value drops  will be taxed less. (You can read how property taxes are calculated in Guilford County here.) While lower taxes sounds great for the homeowner, lower tax revenues across a large area mean drastic changes for the entire community.

At any rate, tracking the housing inventory in Greensboro shows what everyone probably knows: There’s a great many properties for sale. As of June 5th, per our local Multiple Listing System (the database all properties listed by area Realtors) showed there are 3304 residential properties on the market. These include both ‘active’ and ‘pending’ listings. I include those units whose sales are pending because until they close, they’re not sold. And there has been many a fumble twixt contract and key exchange.

Compared with the same week last year, inventory is up. This week last year there were 3024 homes listed.

At the same time, the average list price is down from the same week last year. $222,871 this year versus $244,812 last year.

These prices are averages across all property types, across all zip codes. The ‘price of apples’ in some zip codes is decidedly more robust than in others:

Of course, some of those 3304 listings are indeed slated to close. Keeping a good thought towards that, the break down of active/pending listings in property types is this:

And active/pending by zip code is this:

Sadly, there is a portion of these listings that are foreclosures. The breakdown of the percentage of foreclosures in the overall numbers follow:

Eventually, there will be more buyers and fewer available properties. Until then, maybe we should get used to applesauce.

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If you have questions, comments or a good joke to share shoot me an email.  I’m a full time Realtor®, I love what I do and would be thrilled to hear from you.

* All data from Triad Multiple Listing Service (MLS) and is only as good as the information entered, which is done by humans, who make errors. The information is only for those residential zip codes for Greensboro and does not include the surrounding communities.

Tags: 304 Turnstone Circle, Foreclosures in Greensboro, Greensboro, Greensboro housing, Greensboro housing statistics, Greensboro real estate prices, Guilford County, Guilford County tax rates, housing inventory, housing market, MLS, MLS#577643, Multiple List, Multiple Listing Service, Real estate market, Triad Mutliple Listing Service

Nothing shattering in the new foreclosure listings in Greensboro last week. There were 15 new listings, compared with 19 the week before but more than the two weeks prior (12  & 14). The only slightly good news is that the trend for rolling 12-week periods shows a decline. There were 181 foreclosures listed in the 12 weeks ending May 30th. This is the lowest that metric has been since the 12-week period ending April 18th.

*Meh*

As has been the case almost from the beginning of this sad state of affairs,  zip codes 27405 and 27406 are carrying the lion’s share of the listings, with 19% and 24%, respectively. But 27407 is now approaching their numbers with 18% of the foreclosures.

A big change has been in the 27410 zip code. At the beginning of the year, only about 7% of total listings were located there. Now it is about 13%. It should be noted that 27410 is by far the largest zip code both geographically and in regards to the number of overall listings, so that fact that there is a growing percentage of foreclosures isn’t surprising. You can read a profile of the 27410 zip code I wrote here.

Of the new foreclosure listings last week, the 15 were (mostly) spread evenly over 6 of 9 zips.

Comparing last week with the corresponding week from last year, and 2010 has been worse in both the actual number of listings for the week and in the 12-week rolling period. Way worse:

Frankly, there will probably be new foreclosures coming on the market for some time. Even while things may start improving in the economy as a whole, the foreclosure process take weeks and months to work through the pipeline. So we won’t see properties hit the market for some time that are already headed that way.

However the numbers shake out, you can read about them here.

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If you have questions, comments or a good joke to share shoot me an email.  I’m a full time Realtor®, I love what I do and would be thrilled to hear from you.

* All data from Triad Multiple Listing Service (MLS) and is only as good as the information entered, which is done by humans, who make errors. The information is only for those residential zip codes for Greensboro and does not include the surrounding communities

Tags: 27405, 27406, 27407, 27410, Greensboro foreclosures, Greensboro housing statistics, Greensboro zip codes

[THIS IS A PERSONAL POST - This has nothing to do with real estate, Greensboro, Realtors, buyers or sellers. Feel free to avert your eyes.]

Some times things are tough. Sometimes we feel we’re in this thing all by ourselves. Then we realize there are people paying attention to us even when we are hardly paying attention to ourselves.

Today I was reminded that, in addition to the wonder who is my husband, I have friends.

I have friends who like me in spite of my occasionally obnoxious behavior.

I have friends who sympathize with my struggles when even I don’t realize I’m struggling.

And I have friends who just like me.

I was given a gift of a martini glass this evening. It was from someone who has seen me grow older, fatter, leaner, dumber, smarter, healthier, more buxom and – recently – chestless. Throughout it all, I never changed in her eyes.

Having a friend like that is more than good. It’s a blessing.

A Blessing.

I am blessed.

Shhh. Be very, very quiet. There have been Good News Faeries about, tempting us with little morsels of cheer. If we’re not careful, we may begin to feel better and worry a little less. Then what will we do with our time?

Wait. I know exactly what I’ll do. A cartwheel.

The National Association of Realtors reports that housing sales nationwide were up – way up – in April. And in Greensboro we did our share. There were 274 closings in April in Greensboro*. That’s the 4th straight month of increases, 18% more than last April and is actually the highest since – wait for it – August of 2008.

Granted, a great deal of this can surely be attributed to the Home Buyers’ Tax Credit which is now a part of our past. But thost 273 properties represent about 548 or happy folks, not including the movers, lenders, Realtors, appliance sales people, and pizza delivery people who benefit from housing sales. (It is almost obligatory that you order pizza to be delivered the at the end of a day of moving furniture. One wonders how people changes domiciles before Domino’s existed)

But there’s more to the upswing than just the raw number of sales. The average listing price and average sales price also increased, whilst the average days on market declined.

And if we look really closely, we see that in April, the percentage of closings that were foreclosures was less in 2010 (19%) than 2009 (27%). That can indicate that the sales in April were not investors look to scarf up deals but homeowners. Awesome.

Sales were up in most Greensboro zip codes, although 27405 and 27406 – those most impacted by foreclosure listings – didn’t enjoy the same lift. (Wow. Look at 27410 in 2007. Looks like it giving the finger to the rest of the graph!)

Who knows what the May sales will show us, but I’ll take four months of improvement over the alternative any day.

Now, please excuse me as I go to practice my cartwheels. If you hear sirens in town, you’ll know I need more work on them.

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If you have questions, comments or a good joke to share shoot me an email.  I’m a full time Realtor®, I love what I do and would be thrilled to hear from you.

* All data from Triad Multiple Listing Service (MLS) and is only as good as the information entered, which is done by humans, who make errors. The information is only for those residential zip codes for Greensboro and does not include the surrounding communities

Tags: Greensboro housing statistics, Greensboro zip codes, Multiple Listing Service, National Association of Realtors, Triad MLS

After pretty much ignoring the data about new foreclosure listings in Greensboro for a few weeks (uh, months) I’m back at it. Sadly, not much has really changed.

Overall, the news about real estate has actually been more positive lately. I hesitate to type that too loudly as it may scare off the good mojo. And some of the good sales information is no doubt due to the Home Buyer’s Tax Credit that recently went the way of the VCR so we may start hearing more subdued reports regarding pending sales and mortgage applications. But there does seem to be a different atmosphere out there. I have clients who are interested in buying, even though they won’t be getting paid by the government to do so, and the wild look in many Realtors’ eyes has been turned down to a mere “freaked out” look rather than the “total panic” we’ve all gotten used to seeing.

Back to Greensboro’s foreclosures, suffice to say that there are plenty of them and the numbers continue to grow at a sickly rate every week. This is too bad because last year I was writing about how weekly listings and – to me, more illustrative of the situation – the number of listings over the previous 12 weeks was declining.

Not any more.

As a matter of fact, year over year comparisons of last week’s numbers show a decided increase in listings. And the trend shows no real indication of slowing.

The numbers:

The week ending last Sunday (May 23rd) had 19 new foreclosures listed. All but one Greensboro zip code – 27408 – had listings, with 27455 having the most at 5.

Looking at these zip codes over the last 4 weeks we see that 27405 and 27406 have had the most foreclosure listings at 15 and 17 respectively. There were no new listings in 27408 over the last four weeks.

Taking all foreclosure listings over all Greensboro zips over the last 12 weeks, it’s easy to see that see that there are still three zip codes that have been disproportionately impacted by foreclosures. 27405, 27406 and 27408 have a combined total of 114 listings over the last 12 weeks out of 186 for all zip codes. That translates to over 60% of foreclosures. On the other end of the spectrum, 27408 had 1% of foreclosures listed over the same period.

The 12-week rolling period isn’t any more cheering. The trend is up. And then up some more:

Being sufficiently depressed over all this so I decided to look at the same week last year. It didn’t make me feel any better:

I’m going to choose to believe all this activity is like when a toilet gets backed up and then a great woosh of … well, of stuff that smells exactly like these foreclosure numbers….goes flying through the pipes all at once.

Enough of my poetic writing. I’m off to make some showing appointments. That’s good news, right?

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If you have questions, comments or a good joke to share shoot me an email.  I’m a full time Realtor®, I love what I do and would be thrilled to hear from you.

* All data from Triad Multiple Listing Service (MLS) and is only as good as the information entered, which is done by humans, who make errors. The information is only for those residential zip codes for Greensboro and does not include the surrounding communities

Tags: Foreclosures by Greensboro zip code, Greensboro foreclosures, Greensboro housing statistics, Triad MLS

Some days it just feels good to be here. And by here, I mean sitting in a lovely bookstore cafe, watching engaged people reading, laughing, figuring out the world’s problems. And sometimes the world outside is an alright place to be as well.

Granted that over the last couple of years things haven’t been much fun. From fiscal shenanigans in billion dollar corporations to photos of innocent wildlife covered in gooey oil in the Gulf of Mexico to having to cry through the series finale of “Lost” – it’s been tough out there!

But Greensboro area has gotten some cheery news of late:

• American Express has chosen Guilford County for its new data center, a coup indeed. And with IBM’s data center to the east of us and both Google  and Apple data centers to the west of us, The Old North State just may grow to be one of the most wired places around.
• Vitacost.com is adding 250 jobs at its Lexington call center
• And our wonderful Children’s Museum has an edible schoolyard! Whilst this is not going to be featured on CNBC, it’s an honor as it’s the only one licensed in the country.

Things are still tough for many, but a few folks will be getting hired, some spirits will be lifted and our next generation will be learning the joys of learning that veggies don’t actually grow inside shrink wrap.

So, be of good cheer.

Tags: Apple data center, Edible Garden, Google data center, Greensboro, Greensboro Children's Museum, Guilford County, IBM data center, News & Record, NY Times article, Vitacost.com

I am not a super technophile. But I do know that in the race for Google Fiber between several communities, Greensboro is in the top 10 according to one blog.

Some may be surprised. I’m not.

Some communities have opted to make temporary name changes to themselves to show their enthusiasm for getting super high-speed fiber. But even with out taking such measures Greensboro has precisely the environment that can highlight the positive potential for fast, faster, fastest internet speeds. To whit:

• there are 2 universities and 3 colleges and a school of law in Greensboro. And UNC Greensboro and NC A&T are poised to make some real noise with the joint effort in nanotechnologies.
• the arrival of FedEx will lead to high tech industries in the area
• Greensboro-based RF Micro has just announced it will develop solar cells and is way ahead of the curve on this.

Don’t take my word for it. Check out this video. (I love it when smart people agree with me).

Here is the city’s draft of it’s application to Google.

So, we don’t need to change our name to make Greensboro and Google a good fit. Hey! We won’t even need to change the monogram on the towels!

Tags: credit crunch, Fox8 News, Google Fiber, GoogleforGreensboroApplication, nanotechnology, NC A&T, News & Record, RF Micro