Kerry Ellison

In todays negative economic environment it is hard to find some positive news. I thought I would share some surprising news with you!!!

I was reading a Forbes blog dated 1/7/09 and it featured Little Rock as one of America's 25 top housing market. Little Rock's housing market is predicted to only drop 1%. In Pulaski County average sales price dropped 2.2 % from 2007. The higher priced areas of Pulaski County dropped 2.3 %. However, the most impressive figure is our listing inventory is down 15.5 % which means we are selling the backlog of homes. Little Rock's foreclosure rate is 1 out of 200 where the nation's rate is 1 out of 54. Click on the link to read the full article.....

In Depth: America's 25 Strongest Housing Markets

This article is published by the National Association of Realtors..

Existing-home sales rose unexpectedly while inventory declined, led by a surge of sales in the West. Existing-home sales - including single-family, townhomes, condominiums and co-ops - jumped 6.5 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate¹ of 4.74 million units in December from a downwardly revised pace of 4.45 million units in November, but are 3.5 percent below the 4.91 million-unit pace in December 2007.For all of 2008 there were 4,912,000 existing-home sales, which was 13.1 percent below the 5,652,000 transactions recorded in 2007.

What does this mean to our local market? Are attitudes changing? Is it a good time to buy? The answer is yes! That is why it is called a buyer's market.

If the stimulus package is passed with a $15,000 tax credit the market will go crazy. There was a decline in listings by 1600 (15.7%) homes in Pulaski County and in our higher dollar areas were down by 561 (12.1%) homes. We are still experiencing a decrease in units sold, but we are not continually adding inventory. If you have had your home on the market or have been considering selling, feel free to contact me for an up-to-date value of your home KerryEllison@kw.com.

I will be updating my blog with the 5 year trends in listings and units sold, please log onto my website Your Market Expert.

The Housing Market should see some positive results from the signing of the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008 by President Bush. The benefits are for first time home buyers in the form of a home-buyer tax credit. First-time buyers are vital to the housing market because they start the domino effect. They also keep the market stable because of the demand vs. supply.

Buyers who haven't owned a property in the last three years can qualify for a tax credit up to $7,500 or 10 % of there home purchase price. To qualify homes can be purchased from April 9, 2008 till July 1, 2009. There are income limits and recapture taxes, so please check with your financial advisor.

The housing bill includes higher loan limits allowing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to increase loan limits based around median pricing, which means we will see the jumbo loan limits raised. The effect on the local market will be lower interest rates on loans higher than $417,000. WE should see some positive results in the higher end areas of Central Arkansas.

Using history as a guide, Lawrence Yun, chief economist of the National Association of Realtors believes the Housing Act could represent a boost of 10% in the number of homes sold.

In Central Arkansas we have seen a slight slow down in homes sold. With the new incentives for first time home buyers we expect to see increase sales.

See below for the trends in Pulaski County:(the numbers below are from CARMLS and are based on Jan. through July 31 numbers)

Year: TTL Listed # sold Avg. List $sold Avg DOM % Expired

2006 5403 3494 $171,558 58 .02%

2007 6385 3461 $177,974 76 15.72%

2008 5541 2798 $176,168 79 22.83%

Our local market is only slightly down from 06 and 07 numbers, but the inventory is adjusting and surprisingly prices have only seen a 1.1 % decrease. We still have approximately a 13 month supply of homes, however we are seeing much stronger markets in specific neighborhoods with only 5 months of supply.