Orlando Real Estate March 2011 Sales

March Orlando real estate sales were up and down. The number of sales was up more than 18% over February, and the median price was up more than 7% over February. The total number of homes available for sale was down almost 7% while the number of bank owned homes was down over 18%. Even short sale inventory was down more than 8% while the number of pending short sales was up more than 9%. Now for the numbers.

The number of homes for sale in Orlando dropped to 12,549 last month with 1,389 or 11.1% bank owned and 4,639 or 37.0% short sales. This is the first time in quite a while distressed inventory fell below 50% of our local market. Pending contracts have been on the rise with 9,933 homes currently under contract. Of those 1,931 or 19.4% are bank owned and a whopping 6,390 or 64.3% are short sales. Banks are continuing to see slow closings partially due to the robo-signing scandal of last Fall, and short sales - well they're short sales.

The number of closed sales last month was even higher than my expectation of 2,400. We saw 2,546 closings with a median price of $102,000. I had predicted $100,000, so prices were a little better than my expectations as well. Of the closed sales 1,150 or 45.2% were bank owned and 643 or 25.3% were short sales. The 643 short sales only represented 10.1% of the all the short sales currently under contract. The median sales price of bank owned properties climbed to $76,950 while short sales median price rose to $104,000. Equity sales accounted for 753 or 29.6% of all closed transactions and saw a slight decline in median price to $155,000. Cash sales remained strong with 1,380 or 54.2%, but that was a steep decline from the more than 60% we saw in January and February. The median price for cash sales dipped slightly from $64,000 in February to $63,000. Financed sales of 1,166 or 45.8% of the total saw a decline in median price to $142,000 from $150,000 the month before. The current inventory of homes for sale represents only a 4.9 month supply based upon March's sales.

David Welch Real Estate Optimist, Orlando Real Estate, Any Home-Any Phone