Current RMLS Market Action Report - January 2009

Well here we are in 2009, we have a new President, a new bailout package and the same old tired real estate market (really, it's tired, we're dodging the yawns every day and it's growing grey ear hairs...seriously).

Well we have some interesting numbers this time around and the report itself has been changed up a bit, RMLS decided to break the report out into separate areas, Portland and SW Washington are now separate reports (though they are still linked into the same PDF in the included links). Getting to the juicy stuff we've got mostly bad news of course, but some bit of light in this report; lets get to it...

Click Image for Report PDF

First off I'm going to hit you with the bad news, lets get it over with shall we? Last month our inventory was at 14.1 months, high...well just when you thought it couldn't get any higher not only does it get higher but it breaks previous records at 19.2 months in the Portland metro area. New listings comparing January 09 to December 08 are up 123.2% which is actually normal for December-to-January listing numbers; for instance in 07-08 we saw a similar jump from 2,276 new listings in December 07 to 4,937 in January 08. So, no surprise there.

Getting to depreciation levels (I can't wait to start saying "appreciation" again...soon...I feel it), my prediction last month of West Portland dipping into negative territory was wrong, but just barely wrong...Decembers numbers, 1.9% still appreciating, January's numbers 0.3% still appreciating and the only area in all of Portland metro that can say that (of course by the time of this writing they can't...take the party hats off). Lets just run down the list here:

N Portland -0.7%
NE Portland -1.8%
SE Portland -4.7%
Gresham/Troutdale IMPROVED slightly from -8.2% in December to -7.8% in January, way to go Gresham!
Milwaukie/Clackamas/Happy Valley -5%
the OC and Canby -5.1%
Lake Oswego/West Linn more than joined the rest of us here on Earth at -5.8%
NW Washington Co -4.2%
Beaverton/Aloha took a note from Gresham apparently and went the other way from -4.4% in December to -4.2% in January (hey, it's an improvement even if it could easily be in a margin of error, I'll take it)
Tigard/Wilsonville -6.5%
Hillsboro/Forest Grove -6.9%
Mt Hood saw an improvement as well and actually the most notable improvement to boot, from -10.5% to -7.6%.

Every January RMLS also releases numbers by county, for 2008 everything was dandy, Clackamas at 3%, Multnomah at 9%, Washington at 6%...Of course that's not the case this year but overall Multnomah county is fairing better than suburbia at -1%, Clackamas at -6% and Washington at -5%.

Ok, closed sales form December to January were down 25.8% in a single month marking the largest slip in closed sales for a single month since RMLS began keeping records in 1992. The average sales price was down 13.3% from January 2008 to January 2009 which is actually quite a bit higher than I was anticipating. The median sales price dropped 10.7% and we saw a 1.2% drop in average sale price form December 08 to January 09 and a 1.1% decline in the median in the same time period.

Alright, ready for the good news? Comparing December 08 to January 09 pending sales rose 52.5% but of course a December-January jump is normal for pending sales however it's not usually quite such a solid jump (looked a few years back just now, was more like 25% usually). So this jump could be a sign of more positive reports to come? Stay tuned.

SW Washington, your inventory jumped to 21 months. January 2008 to January 2009 closed sales down 17.1% and pending sales down 16.2%. There was a similar jump in pending sales from December 08 to January 09 but it was more in line with historical numbers at 32% but SW Washington did do better in new listings (that is they didn't have a huge percentage increase) being up only 68.8%.

I'm looking forward to the Spring reports, historically they are positive, not even this market can keep those months down right? right...see ya next month.

To download or view the entire report click on the report image or click here

2008 RMLS Market Action Report Archives