Denver Housing One of the Best in the Country

In today's Rocky Mountain News, it was reported that metro Denver's home sales average prices fell by only 1.1% in November, making it the best performing city in the S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Index. In the twelve months ending with November, Denver performed better than all large markets except Dallas, the report stated. According to them, Denver area prices fell by only 4.3% for that preceding 12 month period. Several things were cited as contributing to Denver's continued improvement; lack of new home inventory and starts, declining inventory, lack of the huge price run up experienced by other cities, lower jobless rate, and the net increase in population. While it may sound dumb to be celebrating even when the figures show a decline, one has to remember that these are figures are comparing average sales prices. Averages are determined by the mix and in Denver the lower priced tier of homes have been selling like hot cakes. To be sure, most of these are being snapped up by investors, but they are still selling. The middle ranges are holding their own while the high end has been building inventory because of slow sales. Combining all of these numbers give us an average. Readers should not be too concerned with the bottom line number but the mix of sales that gave us that number. As many buyers are discovering, they have some healthy competition for quality homes, in some of their price ranges