THE WHOLE FRUIT BASKET

This is the second of a five-part analysis of real estate at Lake of the Pines, California.   In this second analysis, I’m not going to compare apples to apples .  With this one, you get the whole fruit basket–regular sales, foreclosures, short sales, lake fronts, golf course homes, good streets, better streets, and best streets, tiny houses, average-sized houses, and a few behemoths–all of it.  I will compare ALL of the Lake of the Pines homes that sold during the past 12 months (May 19, 2011 through May 18, 2012) with ALL of the homes that sold the previous year (May 19, 2010 through May 18, 2011).

                                                     5/19/10 thru 5/18/11           5/19/11 thru 5/19/12        

Number of homes sold                                  78                                                    81

Highest price sold                                   $1,095,000                                      $915,000

Lowest price sold                                      $120,000                                         $73,000

Average price sold                                    $303,652                                       $290,019

Median price sold                                      $231,500                                      $239,500

Average list price                                       $321,626                                      $306,056

%sold price/list price                                     94%                                               95%

Price per square foot listed                         $154                                             $147

Price per square foot sold                           $145                                              $139

Average days on the market                          125                                                 101

ANALYSIS

You can see that about the same number of homes sold this year (81)  as in the previous year (78), but sold 24 days  faster (101 days on the market to 125).

Prices have risen slightly, about 3%, (comparing the median of $231,500 in 2010-2011 with the median of $239,500 in 2011-2012).

But . . .

Prices have fallen slightly, about 4% (comparing the average of $303,652 in 2010-2011 with the average of $290,019 in 2011-2012).

Prices have fallen slightly, about 4%  (comparing price per square foot  ($145 to $139).  This is probably the most reliable indicator of value.

 SUMMARY

Sales of larger, more expensive, lakefront homes in 2010/2011 skewed the data, rendering contradictory results.  Almost all of the decline in prices can be found at the upper end of the price range.  Keeping this in mind, it is reasonable to state that prices of homes sold at Lake of the Pines, except for the lakefronts, have been relatively unchanged from the previous year through this year.  

In the next  blog, we’re going to get even more sophisticated.  We’ll look at the same Lake of the Pines market for the same two periods of time, but we”ll compare conventional sales with homes sold as foreclosures and short sales.