Golden Eagle Plantation is one of the Tallahassee neighborhoods that we review from time to time to get a feel of the movement of the higher end housing market in Tallahassee. Much like the other neighborhoods that we have reviewed, home values have fallen in Golden Eagle. With nearly 18 months of supply of homes for sale in Golden Eagle, you might think that this is a neighborhood that is really struggling to get by. Ironically, that is not the case. Compared with many other high value neighborhoods, Golden Eagle is doing pretty much the same, maybe even “less poorly.” High End Home Inventories Sky High The first thing that I look at each month as all the data from sales is collected is what effect recent sales have had on the relationship between supply and demand for housing in Tal... 05/05/2010

We must always remember that real estate is ruled by supply and demand, just as is every other commodity that is market driven. If one keeps a vigilant eye on the relationship between the supply and demand of homes for sale, then one should be able to clearly identify the near future movements of the the housing market. When I wrote an article on the supply and demand for housing in Tallahassee back in 2008, I forecast-ed dropping prices due to oversupply. This was not rocket science, just a simple study of housing inventories. Today’s post is somewhat more complex, but if you take the time to fully understand what it demonstrates, then you will truly understand why home values will continue to drop. This is not your typical “REALTOR” blog article, rather it is a fair and accurate anal... 05/04/2010

Killearn Lakes Unit 1 home values appear to be somewhat more stable than many of the homes in other Tallahassee neighborhoods. Home values are still dropping in KLP1, but they are no where near the levels that we have seen elsewhere. In the real estate graph below, we have plotted all of the monthly average home values in Killearn Lakes Unit 1 and then determined the 1 year (red line), the 5 year (green line), and the 10 year trend (blue line) of average home values. By studying these “moving averages” we can get a feel for where the housing market is headed. A few points that jump out at me when I look at this graph of Killearn Lakes Unit 1 home values is that much of the results parallel the rest of the Tallahassee real estate market. It appears the market peaked 3 or 4 years ago, and... 05/03/2010

Killearn Lakes Unit 1 home values appear to be somewhat more stable than many of the homes in other Tallahassee neighborhoods. Home values are still dropping in KLP1, but they are no where near the levels that we have seen elsewhere. In the real estate graph below, we have plotted all of the monthly average home values in Killearn Lakes Unit 1 and then determined the 1 year (red line), the 5 year (green line), and the 10 year trend (blue line) of average home values. By studying these “moving averages” we can get a feel for where the housing market is headed. A few points that jump out at me when I look at this graph of Killearn Lakes Unit 1 home values is that much of the results parallel the rest of the Tallahassee real estate market. It appears the market peaked 3 or 4 years ago, and... 05/03/2010

I like seeing the steady growth in the number of home sales, as we inch higher and higher towards historical norms. And there are some other positive signs in the Tallahassee real estate market that are evidenced in the real estate graph below. This one graph measures four very important one-year trends for home sales in the Tallahassee housing market. Remember, a one-year trend measurement removes the effects of seasonality as each point on the graph represents a 365 day rolling average. What we see now is four trends that are all moving in a direction that is beneficial to the return of appreciating home values: Daily New Listings – Currently at a 3 year low, the number of new homes coming onto the market seems to have leveled off at just 15 per day. This number represents nearly a 30... 05/02/2010

I like seeing the steady growth in the number of home sales, as we inch higher and higher towards historical norms. And there are some other positive signs in the Tallahassee real estate market that are evidenced in the real estate graph below. This one graph measures four very important one-year trends for home sales in the Tallahassee housing market. Remember, a one-year trend measurement removes the effects of seasonality as each point on the graph represents a 365 day rolling average. What we see now is four trends that are all moving in a direction that is beneficial to the return of appreciating home values: Daily New Listings – Currently at a 3 year low, the number of new homes coming onto the market seems to have leveled off at just 15 per day. This number represents nearly a 30... 05/02/2010

By closely monitoring the short term inventory trends in the Tallahassee housing market, we see evidence that the number of homes for sale in Tallahassee has stopped growing, as the annual seasonal growth trend has finished its course. What this means is that over the past 30 days, more homes have left the market than have entered. Real estate inventory levels have stopped rising. The short term inventory trends help identify current seasonal changes, if any. The graph below shows new inventory in red, departing (homes that sold, expired, canceled, etc.) in green, and the difference is shown in yellow. When the red is higher than the green, we see short term inventory trends grow, while when all we see is green, housing levels fall. Right now, the pattern has shifted back to reduction. ... 05/02/2010

Tallahassee single family detached home prices have been trending down since their values peaked at $222K in April of 2007. Today, the one-year trend of average single family detached home prices in Leon County has fallen to $191K, but we still are much higher than historic sales levels indicate where we should be. In the real estate graph below, we can see how significant the rise in prices were starting in 2003. The orange line in the graph below shows the pace of growth in the average price of a single family detached home during the 1990s, yet we blew way past this established growth rate during the five-year boom in the housing market. Had the boom not occurred, our past pace would have our average home price much closer to $170K, rather than our $190K+ level that we are seeing. P... 05/02/2010

The rate at which homes “failed to sell” has been dropping since August 2009, when the rate hit 85%. We measure the total number of listing failures (homes that expired, canceled, or were withdrawn) in the Tallahassee MLS, and divide that number by the total number of new listings over the same period of time. Currently, the trend is at 72%, which while better than before, still isn’t very good if you want to sell a home. The “failed to sell” trend is something that we find very disturbing, as the shadow inventory of homes is growing larger and larger as this trend continues to hover at roughly 3 in every 4 homes listed for sale ends up failing to sell. Will these homeowners be able to hang on by continuing to live in their homes, or will the end up selling for an amount that is short w... 05/02/2010

  Today marks the end of the Homebuyer Tax Credit for people who still want to take advantage of the stimulus money that the government felt would cure a wounded housing market. Nobody can argue that the stimulus did not stimulate, but it certainly did not fix the heart of the problem. It seems as if we need to get a few “numbers people” involved in this solution. Housing Market Needs To Stimulate Move Up Home Buyers For the sake of simplicity in this article, we will break potential buyers into two distinct groups. First time homebuyers (they do not currently own a home) and move-up buyers (they currently own a home and could include down-sizing buyers). It appears that nearly 100% of the effort in the housing stimulus program has been designed to attract the first time home buyer. It ... 04/30/2010

  It is always a sellers’ market in real estate, and it is important to know this whether you are buying or selling real estate. This is a fact that is often missed by people who want to buy a home, as well as by sellers who want to sell a home. If you have been paying attention to the housing market at all, then you know there is a nationwide glut of homes for sale. Both the National Association of Homebuilders and the National Association of REALTORS like to gloss over this fact, but the truth is we over-built in most areas around the country and it will take growth at each and every local level to consume the excess inventory of homes. We know that when trying to sell any commodity, when supply is far higher than the rate of demand, pricing pressure ensues and values drop until more ... 04/29/2010

  It is always a sellers’ market in real estate, and it is important to know this whether you are buying or selling real estate. This is a fact that is often missed by people who want to buy a home, as well as by sellers who want to sell a home. If you have been paying attention to the housing market at all, then you know there is a nationwide glut of homes for sale. Both the National Association of Homebuilders and the National Association of REALTORS like to gloss over this fact, but the truth is we over-built in most areas around the country and it will take growth at each and every local level to consume the excess inventory of homes. We know that when trying to sell any commodity, when supply is far higher than the rate of demand, pricing pressure ensues and values drop until more ... 04/29/2010

Home values in the Glen at Golden Eagle are moving downwards, much like the rest of the Tallahassee real estate market. But there might be some signs of stabilization in this Northeast Tallahassee neighborhood which features homes from $150K to $250K. Recently, reader “Don” wrote in with some questions about the Glen at Golden Eagle. Don wrote: We’re always on here! I need some info about what is happening in the Glen Golden Eagle: Any forecasts for home values in this area? (down, way down) Is demand really low in the Glen? Is this neighborhood a reseller nightmare area? Is it hard to resell with a pool? Is there any thing about the Glen we should be asking, but have not? Will there be HOTTER deals in Ox Bottom in next 12-18 months that we should wait based on data we can ascertain, (e... 04/28/2010

At TallahasseeRealEstateCompany.com 04/27/2010

Joe Manausa | Century 21 First Realty | 850.523.6118 6110 Borderline, Tallahassee, FL 3BR/2BA Single Family House offered at $330,000 Year Built 1991 Sq Footage 2,048 Bedrooms 3 Bathrooms 2 full, 0 partial Floors 1 Parking 2 Car garage Lot Size 1 sqft HOA/Maint $0 per month DESCRIPTION Totally updated house. Very open and bright floor plan--and NO CARPET. Separate living and family rooms. Built-in work station. Gourmet kitchen with granite countertops, drop lights and beautiful wood cabinetry. HUGE backyard and lanai, begging for a pool. Alarm---please call owner night before to turn off. see additional photos below PROPERTY FEATURES - Central A/C - Central heat - Fireplace - Hardwood floor - Family room - Living room - Dining room - Dishwasher - Refrigerator - Stove/Oven - Microwave -... 04/27/2010

Joe Manausa | Century 21 First Realty | 850.523.6118 3166 Ferns Glen Drive, Tallahassee, FL 5BR/4BA Single Family House offered at $294,500 Year Built 1981 Sq Footage 3,123 Bedrooms 5 Bathrooms 4 full, 0 partial Floors Unspecified Parking None Lot Size .55 acres HOA/Maint $0 per month DESCRIPTION Totally updated home, across the street from the lake. Children's Oasis in the backyard! Four or five bedrooms, including two Master Suites. New, designer bathrooms, open floor plan and recreation room or Man Cave completes the package. Almost any configuration you want with all this space. Very easy to show. see additional photos below PROPERTY FEATURES - Central A/C - Central heat - Fireplace - Hardwood floor - Tile floor - Family room - Living room - Bonus/Rec room - Dining room - Dishwashe... 04/27/2010

One of the first things you learn about the real estate market when you start a career in this business is that “real estate is local.” Basically, we had come to learn that people who buy and sell homes were from the local market area. But the internet is really changing the way things work in the housing industry. Now a days, the Tallahassee Real Estate Blog sees daily visitors from all over the world. With the analytics package that we maintain on our real estate web site, we get great reports showing our coverage of the worldwide real estate market. Does this help us with homes for sale in Tallahassee? Absolutely. The fact is many of our home buyers are shopping for real estate from many parts of the world. No longer do we just market our properties at the local level, we must reach... 04/27/2010

Last week, we uncovered an interesting methodology that we can use to evaluate long term home sales trends in the Tallahassee real estate market (or any other market in which you might have an interest). It involved using 20 years worth of housing market data in order to show the 1 year, 5 year, and 10 year moving averages for different metrics that we wanted to measure in the real estate market. No other measurement is more important than overall home sales activity, and we measure this by looking at monthly home sales each month. In the real estate graph below, we have recorded monthly activity along with all of the trends mentioned above. In the real estate graph above, we have borrowed an analysis process from Wall Street (thanks to long-time reader Steve R.). It has been a common p... 04/26/2010

Debt collectors can no longer claim ignorance of the law as an excuse for violating the Fair Debt Collections Practices Act (FDCPA) while attempting to collect a debt. On Wednesday, the United States Supreme Court handed down a ruling that severely restricts the "bona fide error" defense under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act for debt collectors that send erroneous collection notices. In a 7-2 ruling, the high court ruled that collection law firms could not use misinterpretations of the law in a "bona fide error" defense under the FDCPA. In the matter of Jerman v. Carlisle, McNellie, Rini, Kramer & Ulrich, Karen Jerman sued an Ohio law firm for violating the FDCPA when it attempted to foreclose on her home following payment on the mortgage. In its initial collection notice, the la... 04/25/2010

Killearn Lakes (Unit 2) home values have dropped roughly 20% since the top of the market three years ago. We keep a close eye on this  popular Tallahassee subdivision, as it is representative of what the median home buyer has been seeking in Tallahassee since I got in the business in 1991. Recently, long-time reader “Steven R.” answered my request for “math advice” in the analysis of home price forecasting, as he left the following advice in the comments of a recent blog post: Joe, I don’t think prices will drop 10%, but I can’t tell you exactly what it will do because you have the data. Rather than using regression toward the mean, you should plot the price of homes vs. moving averages. Select a moving average such that when the price crosses the moving average to the downside price mo... 04/23/2010