Bay State home prices poised to fall again on the heels of another big sales drop
Home sales have been in free fall across Massachusetts since the home buyer tax credit went kaput on April 30th.
Just take a look at the gruesome September numbers just out this morning.
But most tellingly, prices, which all through the summer rode the afterglow of the tax credit, are now clearly pointing south as well.
The median home price in Massachusetts plunged to $287,000 in September, down from $316,500 in August, the Warren Group finds. That new median price - $287,000 - is still up over September 2009, but by less than a percent - .35 percent.
Like it nor not, prices are headed down again after a year or more of being artificially buoyed by the home buyer tax credit. In fact, we are probably already below those 2009 prices as we speak - just wait until the October home sales report comes out in late November.
This big shift in prices has yet to be picked up by the Massachusetts Association of Realtors, though spare me the Realtor conspiracy theories. The Warren Group data includes distressed sales, while MAR's data does not, a difference that goes back years now.
Home sales, in turn, were the lowest seen in the state since September 1991, another grim time for the real estate market in Massachusetts, the Warren Group finds. (As many of you know, I write a weekly column on a range of business issues, including the real estate market, for Banker & Tradesman, which is published by the Warren Group.
The Warren Group reports a 12.9 percent drop in single family home sales over September 2009, while the Massachusetts Association of Realtors pegs the drop at 13.8 percent.
Another important stat, the overall supply of homes on the market, is also up.
We are now on the verge of breaking into double digits when it comes to months of unsold homes on the market, with the amount of inventory having risen to 9.9 months in September, MAR reports.
The question now becomes how far home prices will fall before they hit bottom?
I look forward to reading your predictions on that one.
