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November Sales Numbers
First American Title compiles this data monthly from actual recorded documents. They send it to us agents, and because I love this kind of information, I love sharing it with you.
If you find this type of spreadsheet boring, I’m sorry. If you’re fascinated by it and find that “numbers tell a story,” then you’re like me. 
Enjoy:
Year to date Bellingham Home Sales
Ahhh… statistics!!! If you love real estate, then you love statistics! Here’s an interesting batch of numbers now: Bellingham home sales, year to date, and a comparison of the same time period in ‘08. This is just good, statistical fun!
2009 Bellingham Home Sales
- Number of homes sold so far: 872
- Average price: $339,132
- Average time on market: 92 days
- Highest price home sold: $2,000,000
- Lowest price home sold: $39,900
- Total dollar volume: $295,723,008
2008 Bellingham Home Sales
- Number of homes sold in the same time period in ‘08: 855
- Average price: $359,952
- Average time on market: 93 days
- Highest price home sold: $3,300,000
- Lowest price home sold: $70,000
- Total dollar volume: $307,759,387
Where would your house fit in?
Note: This session of “Good clean fun with numbers” has been brought to you courtesy of the NWMLS.
Comments: Please leave a comment.Bellingham Home Sales for October
Every month, First American Title sends us at RE/MAX the sales data for the previous month. It shows monthly and year-to-date sales totals, average prices, volume change as a percentage — and all of it is broken down into property types.
The most obvious trend to spot is that new construction home sales have declined more than 60% since last October. In October ‘08 there were 10 Bellingham sales of new construction. In October ‘09 there were 3.
It’s not exactly big news that new construction is almost non-exisitent. Banks generally aren’t loaning on new construction (definitely not on spec houses). They’re still selling off brand new construction short sales and bank-owned properties, and won’t even think of lending until that inventory dries up. The word “speculation” doesn’t go over well at all with lenders or their investors right now.
Used single family homes, however, are up almost 25% over October ‘08. There were only 82 sales last Oct., while Oct. ‘09 saw 109 sales. The first time home buyer tax credit DEFINITELY played a roll in that jump. In fact, it’s no coincidence that across the entire U.S., the National Assocation of Realtors predicts that the First Time Home Buyer Tax Credit has been responsible for bringing in 25% more first time buyers than if there hadn’t been an incentive.
At any rate, here’s a look at the entire chart for October. Give me a shout if you’d like to know where YOUR house would fit into this chart.
Lake Whatcom Waterfront Home Sales
It’s a dream of mine to live with my family in a waterfront home on Lake Whatcom. I LOVE Lake Whatcom. I’ve paddled every inch of its shoreline many, many times over (Heather and I call that 25+mile workout the “Big Banana!”)
Just this morning I started my day with a Sudden Valley to Bloedel Donovan Park downwinder on my stand-up paddleboard. As I reached the docks at Bloedel, the view back up the lake was dramatic with low, dark, racing storm clouds, white caps and the abandoned pilings from the lumber mill days rising out of the water. It was spectacular.
And equally spectacular are the houses that enjoy a front-row setting on the water’s edge. So what does it take to take ownership of one of these highly-desirable pieces of Bellingham real estate? Well, let’s check out the NWMLS and see…
Prices as of this post start at $519K for a “fixer upper” of just under 1200 square feet.
In Sudden Valley, your entry level is at $550K right now for a 4BR/2BA with 2400+ square feet. That one is also noted as a “Handyman Special!”
On the upper end of the price spectrum you can make a full price offer at $4.2 million for a near-10,000 square foot 6BR, 5.5BA home with double offices, a theatre, 900 square foot guest quarters and all on a .38 acre lot. Wow!
All told, there are 27 active Lake Whatcom waterfront listings and 3 pending, for a pending ratio of 10%. Average price is about $1.625 million, and that’ll get you about 3,400 square feet.
In the past 6 months, we’ve seen 15 closed sales with an average price of $844,600K — roughly HALF the average price for those actively listed home. Those closed sales had an average time on market of 218 days, and closed for an average of 94% of final list price. 8 of them dropped their price at least once before getting a sale.
Finally, in that same 6 month period, 16 listings either expired or cancelled without selling, so just slightly more than what sold. No question, the higher end homes (waterfront or not) have been a difficult sell in the recent past. It’s picked up, though. The preceeding 6 month period saw only 6 sales of Lake Whatcom Waterfront Homes, with an average sale price of just $692K.
If you’re interested in knowing where your waterfront home would fit into the market, give me a ring. Who knows… it may even be my family’s future dream home!
Comments: Please leave a comment.Human Hair Thickness vs. Bellingham Land Sales
A few weeks ago we looked at Whatcom County real estate absorption rates — or how quickly the existing inventory in any given area was selling. The slowest-moving area in the County at the time was Mt. Baker/Deming, which had a pending ratio of 13.5% and an absorption rate of nearly 33 months.
Well, those numbers are downright STELLAR next to another category of local real estate: Bellingham lot and land sales! I did a quick study today on the NWMLS for lots and land priced under $200,000. The numbers were downright shocking:
- 186 Active listings.
- 2 Pending sales. (That’s “two”).
That equates to a pending ratio of, NO, not 13.5% like bottom-of-the-list single family residential in Mt. Baker/Deming, but rather, this number: 0.0106382979.
Yes… “0.0106382979″ is the pending ratio of Bellingham lot and land sales as of today. Now, let’s put that number up against the thickness of a human hair in inches, which is, according to Wikipedia, if it’a thick hair, about 0.00708662125 inches.
And we have a winner!!!
Bellingham lot and land sales’ pending ratio CRUSHES the thickness of human hair by a margin of 0.0035516779.
OK… it’s disturbing to talk about Bellingham real estate in terms of miniscule decimal-point numbers. But the truth is that it is very, VERY difficult to sell land right now, for a host of reasons:
- Everybody and their brother who owns some land is trying to sell it right now, so the inventory is f-l-o-o-d-e-d.
- Buying land means tying up large sums of cash, and in this economy cash is king. Or at least a return on your cash is king. And land by itself doesn’t usually give a great (or any) return… not until you build something on it.
- If you do tie up a large sum of cash on the land, you don’t want to have it tied up very long, so you build and re-fi the new structure. Only problem is, there’s very, VERY little money for construction right now. If it’s not going to be owner-occupied, I think it’s fair to say there is NO money for construction right now. (If you know differently, by all means share it!!!)
- Why buy land and build when residential money is hovering around 5%, is readily available for as little as 0% down, and there are hundreds and hundreds of already-built homes to choose from?
On the other hand…
There are some land sellers out there willing to finance the purchase of their lot — no banks involved. And there are banks that own lots that are willing to offer INCREDIBLE financing options on those particular lots, and perhaps a construction loan to go along with it. If you’re curious about either of those, or if you want to compare other categories of Whatcom County real estate to the thickness of things… just let me know.
Comments: Please leave a comment.Screaming Deals Only!!!
In the spirit of Halloween, today’s post celebrates that niche in Bellingham real estate known as the “Screaming Deal!!!”
These house, priced up to $150K, are for those of you whose boss has SLASHED your income… but you’re just DYING to buy your own house… and you’d consider selling to the BLOOD bank to raise your down payment and closing costs… and your BONES ache at the thought of another year in a rental house… (are you catching my subtle Halloween references here? Sorry.)
Right now in the Bellingham real estate market, according to the NW Multiple Listing Service, the cheapest non-short-sale house (because the short sale prices are often irrelevant, in that you may NOT be able to actually buy the house for that low of a price), is priced at $135,900. It’s in Glenhaven, about 25 minutes from downtown. Check it out HERE.
If that’s too far to drive, you could always pick up THIS BEAUTY in the highly desirable Sunnyland neighborhood, priced just under $140K. But when you make the call to your lender for a pre-approval letter, make sure s/he’s qualified to do rehab loans, ’cause this one’s going to need it. (The seller might finance it for you too, with a big enough down payment.)
Now HERE’S ONE just off the I-5 with a GIANT useable shop or studio and tenants already there, out the door and into your portfolio for a cool $150,000. It’s rough, and again it may take some creative financing, but hey — if the intent is there on both sides of the transaction, anything can be accomplished!
These homes may not be the mansion you’re dreaming of… but they’re not total NIGHTMARES either! They serve the purpose of getting first time home buyers on the “real estate escalator” and starting to gain some equity.
Have a Happy, Safe Halloween, all!!!
Comments: Please leave a comment.Bellingham’s Priciest Home
You may’ve read in last week’s news about the $56,600,000 penthouse condo that sold in Hong Kong , making it the highest priced condo anywhere in the world. Price per square foot was $11,350 and get this: The underlying property only has a 99-year-LEASE. Yikes!
How exactly does one “comp” a property that expensive? It’s not like you can look at others that have sold in the past six months, subtract a few bucks here and there for one less bedroom or a slightly better view, and say with certainty that you’re not over-paying. I mean, $56,600,000!!! And it’s not even a detached residence!? Ahh… the uber-rich.
If you want to buy the highest-priced piece of Bellingham Real Estate, you won’t spend even 1/10th of those Hong Kong prices. And right now you’ll have a choice between two properties tied for the top spot:
1) A charming 2-bedroom, 1-bath beach house on just under an acre of your own private peninsula w/ two mini-islands, all surrounded by emerald green water, and…
2) A 4-bedroom, 3.5-bath main home with 3 other 3-bedroom guest homes on just under 215 acres with a 50-stall climate controlled barn, 14,000-square foot indoor arena, all on the Nooksack Riverfront…
Check them both out HERE!
Take your pick of the above, or grab them both! Each is priced at $4,500,000.
Let’s say you could get a loan with a 20% down payment for one of these beauties. You’d need to bring that $900,000 down payment to closing, along with, oh, $75K in closing costs. Let’s call it an even $mil.
So then you’re borrowing $3.6 mil at, let’s say 6% interest for 30 years. You’re monthly payment on principal and interest is a cool $21,583.82. Better keep that 2nd job for now, just to be safe.
Bellingham has some high end real estate, to be sure, but it’s way, WAY more “affordable” than that condo. Happy Shopping!!!
Comments: Please leave a comment.Whatcom High End Home Sales
How frequent are million-dollar sales in Whatcom County, currently and in the recent past?
Let’s start by taking a quick look back to 2008. For that year — caught in the grips of recession from day 1 to day 365 — we saw just over 1 sale a month, county-wide, for a total of 14 homes sold above that mystical million-dollar mark. Exactly half of them dropped their price before selling. Average time on market was 176 days, and average sale price to list price ratio was just over 88%. The highest priced home to sell in the county, per the NWMLS statistics, went for $3.3 million.
This year, with just over 2 months to go before the big apple drops, we’re on track to beat last year’s numbers. Only 11 high-enders have closed up to this pre-Halloween date, but 7 more are currently pending. With a substantial inventory of 62 homes listed for $1 mil or more, we may see the number of closed sales hit 20 before the year’s out.
This year the average time on market for the high enders has nearly doubled from ‘08 to 317 days. About half the 11 closed sales (5) dropped their price before selling. The average sale price to list price ratio, so far, is 91.87%. The highest priced home to sell so far this year went for $2 million even.
In ‘09, 20 high-end homes expired without selling after an average time on market of just under 400 days. Another 20 were cancelled for one reason or another, without selling, after an average time on market of 303 days.
For the most part, these homes are a treat to view and experience (and no doubt to live in), and honestly they’re a treat to sell. It’s not uncommon at ALL to see agents, lenders, and everyone else involved work harder on a o% down, $5000 manufactured home than on a $2 million transaction.
In the group of 62 homes for sale above a million, some of them are so ridiculously overpriced as to be laughable. One of them has come down in price nearly 75% from where it started!!! Yikes! So if you’re toying with the idea of going high-end, don’t be too quick to get sticker-shock. The prices can be as fluid as the rain running off the Italian slate roof and right into the hand-guilded copper gutters.
Comments: Please leave a comment.Sudden Valley Broker’s Caravan
There’s a new trend in Whatcom County Real Estate that is catching on like wild fire amongst the busier agents: The Broker’s Caravan.
The concept is simple: A single organizer — typically an agent with a listing in the respective neighborhood — invites roughly a dozen other agents with listings in that same neighborhood, to band together and visit each and very listing in the group one by one. It’s fast, it’s fun, and it results in some INVALUABLE exposure and feedback.
The power of the caravan is based on getting a relatively large number of people through your for-sale house so they can:
1) Have first-hand perspective if they should have or find a buyer looking for that sort of thing… and… Read the rest of this entry »
Comments: 1 Comment »
