Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Inventory Calm before the storm

We're in the inventory dip before the annual peak. Last year's inventory (2007) peaked nationally and in most areas about on September 27th. The year before it was a bit earlier, on September 20th. Yet there is, for some reason, always a step down at the start of September.

This inventory is incomplete. DQ news will take ~10 more days to put out there results, so I'll do an update with California by country, Las Vegas, and a few other areas I've been letting others collect the data on.

In general, inventory is at about last year's levels. It will be interesting to see sales going forward. Inventory is high. Some areas are holding up better than I thought they would at this point. But... with this week's news on Lehman, Fannie, Freddie, and the concerns with every major bank that was a leader in mortgages... I'm sticking with my previous real estate emotions predictions. We haven't jumped off that roller coaster by any means. But... LA's and in particular the south bay's inventory is dropping by the numbers... but not the number of signs one drives by. Not to mention the foreclosure process is over a year behind the curve.

And I'll let CR blog retail (empty stores). Shudder... Its ugly out there.

Without further comment, the graphs:





5 comments:

Dave Keys said...

All that bad debt the banks are parsing off the books is the proverbial tip of the iceberg. There's a lot more where that came from!

Temecula Web Design | Dave Keys

The Anonymous said...

For starters - props to you for reposting the Arlington graph...So many bubble bloggers are so negative, they spin potitive news, or even worse, quit posting it, it really pisses me off. Glad to see you are comitted to the truth, even if you dont like it.

So I guess you saw the bad news on the Nova bubble blog. Arlington sales are up - first time in over a year. To be honest, I agree with CRT in that I never thought it would happen given there was so much less inventory to sell vs Aug 07. And not only is 2006 and 2007 inventory a distant memory - the trend line now looks to break below 2005 levels - meaning down YOYOYOY.

And again, hidden inventory is a non starter here. Perhaps in our exurbs where there are 10-12 times as many per household than in Arlington, but that wont explain it here. Last time I checked the county land records - there were 28 foreclosures in the month - I think 20 are listed on MLS, so perhaps 8 units of "hidden inventory" - 8 UNITS!!!

And its not like I see any real softening or signs of hope. I saw something on your boy Jim the realtors site - Some high end "immune" areas like La Jolla have like 14 months of inventory. Out there know they are coming down if you wait long enough - I mean you can see it coming - you guys still have hope!!

We kind of have that in our high end exurbs, but not in Arlington. months of inventory is an astoudingly low 3.7 - 2.9 in the high end price bracket I am looking.

If thats not bad enough - in my #1 zipcode, sales are up 21% YOY, first time in a year you can say that. Only 2 foreclosures in the last 12 months - both long since sold...inventory down...months of inventory 2.7, and median prices down a paltry 5.9%, or 6% off the all time peak in Aug 2005...Only 36% more to go before we get back down to the median prices I balked at back in 2003.

Now, I still have some hope, jobs, credit, blah, blah, blah, same thing I say every month. Thing is, YOY positive sales was a big one for me - I really thought it wasnt going to happen for a while and that gave me hope. Now that this indicator fell, I dont know what I have left to hang my hat on. I really feel as if I want to puke.

wannabuy said...

YOY positive sales is a good indicator. I would like to be wrong. But let's first see how this month's banking situation pans out.

Got Popcorn?
Neil

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