La Plata County Residential Sales Through July, 2013

Good morning.  Below are the latest Residential Sales Statistics for La Plata County real estate thru July, 2013.

The Trend Of Rising Median Prices

Check out the recent article in CNN Money at the link below that emphasizes soaring home sales and prices in the Denver and Dallas markets.  This is interesting for our La Plata County market because historically we have lagged one to two years behind market "happenings" in those larger markets.  For La Plata county sellers, this upward trend in the larger markets is good news as it forecasts that median prices will be rising here as well.  For the six month period ending July 31, 2013, the median price in La Plata county was $315,000.00.  In 2006, the high point of the market, the median price in La Plata county was $340,000.00.  We are still 7.4% below that high in 2006, but statistics and the trends in larger markets indicate that our prices here will continue to inch back up. 

There are, of course, trends that might counter a fast return to the market highs of 2006.  The record low mortgage rates have risen this year crimping the purchasing power of potential home buyers.  And, some experts are saying that the rapid price gains in some markets cannot be sustained and might even be unhealthy for the market, raising the risk of a new housing bubble.  But we tend to agree with the experts that say that prices have room for further increases and that affordability remains near historic highs.  Further, the increase in home prices might encourage lenders to ease lending standards since the underlying loans should appreciate in value.   http://money.cnn.com/2013/07/30/news/economy/home-prices/index.html?hpt=hp_t2

We hope you have a great weekend planned as we go into this last month of summer.  Take care and, as always, please call any of us on the Ricedorff Team with your questions or concerns.