Orland Park Homes Supply & Demand Chart for All of 2011 We finally have our year-end statistics and the chart above shows us exactly what a Buyer's Market is.  The red lines represent active Orland Park homes for sale.  The blue line shows us homes that went under contract for the month.  The green line shows homes that sold and closed. One thing I especially like about this chart is that it shows us what months showed the most activity in each category.  August had the largest supply of homes for sale.  More homes went under contract in May and the most closings occurred in July from those May contracts.  Not much went under contract in December, which is usually the norm. If you're a seller in Orland Park and you're wondering why your place is sitting on the market without any offers,... 01/18/2012

Orland Park Brook Hills Subdivision Sales | Orland Park Homes 2011 Brook Hills Subdivision Home Sales 2011 Sold Orland Park Homes List Price Sold Price Closed Date LP/SP Price/Sqft 17240 Brookgate Dr. Orland Park $279,999 $270,000 Jan. 18th 2011 96% $92 11533 Brookshire Dr. Orland Park $299,900 $250,000 Jan. 21st 2011 83% $70 11618 Valley Brook Dr. Orland Park $289,900 $285,000 Feb. 25th 2011 98% $132 11902 Swilly Ct. Orland Park $356,000 $325,000 Mar. 1st 2011 91% $93 17442 Harvest Hill Dr. Orland Park $329,000 $295,000 Mar. 4th 2011 90% $117 17188 Winding Creek Dr. Orland Park $359,900 $325,000 Mar. 11th 2011 90% $100 11600 Brookwood Dr. Orland Park $374,900 $305,000 Mar. 31st 2011 81% $131 11764 Brookshire Dr. Orland Park $344,900 $315,000 Jun. 13th 2011 91% $121 17244 Grange Dr. Orl... 01/16/2012

  Orland Park Home Sales For Detached Single Family Homes The graph above shows Orland Park Home Sales from 2009 to 2011 including Orland Park Traditional Sales, Orland Park Foreclosure Bank Owned & Corporate Sales and Orland Park Short Sales. A traditional sale is a sale that is not distressed meaning not an Orland Park Foreclosure or Orland Park Short Sale. Traditional Orland Park Home Sales ComparisonFrom 2009 to 2011 the comparison of traditional Orland Park Home Sales was pretty consistent. In 2010 the sales in Orland Park dropped slightly. The drop from 227 to 223 wasn’t significant. 2011 they went up to 228 so this demonstrates the over all sales in the Orland Park area has stayed consistent. There is nothing here that is surprising as sales have not suffered too much even in thi... 01/14/2012

    In 2011 there were a total of 282 Single Family Detached Home sales in Orland Park Illinois. The number of sales are up 5.6% compared to 2010 total Home Sales in Orland Park. If you look above you will see the monthly breakdown of the number of sales per month.      What is interesting to see is that there is still a trend that your summer months hold more sales but the amount of sales stays pretty consistent across the board. If you look at the months of Jan. and Nov. you will see they are very close to the number of sales in the summer months.     If your considering selling your property you should not necessarily wait until spring or summer to put your Orland Park Home on the market. In fact, there are a couple of advantages to placing your home on the market during the winter m... 01/11/2012

Orland Park Christmas Lights Recycling Orland Park is inviting residents to recycle Christmas lights that are no longer needed. This is an excellent way to help our environment and clear out those no longer needed holiday decorations. The lights will be processed in the United States and used for fuel and copper. Let's help do our part for the environment and enjoy a safer and healthier holiday! Through Feb. 1st 2012 these lights can be dropped off at the following locations in Orland Park Village's Cultural Arts Center located at 14760 Park Lane.The Franklin Loebe Center, 14650 South Ravinia.Recreation Administration, 14600 South Ravinia.The Sportsplex, 11351 West 159th Street.The Police Station, 15100 South Ravinia.The Frederick T. Owens Village Hall, 14700 South Ravinia Avenue.   Ray... 12/21/2011

  Warm A Heart Winter Drive   The Village of Orland Park is hoping to warm some hearts this winter, along with some heads, hands and more. The Orland Park Village Clerk and Mayor has teamed up to lead Orland Park's "Warm a Heart Winter". They will be collecting new winter hats, scarves, gloves and mittens between Nov. 1st  2011 to Feb. 1 2012. The collected items will be delivered to needy families in the area.   This event has gone on for a few years the community response has been great. This will help people who are less fortunate or are struggling during these tough times.    Contributions may be delivered to the Frederick T. Owens Village Hall at 14700 S. Ravinia Ave. or the Village's Sportplex, 11351 West 159th St. Call 708-403-6188 for more details if your interested in helping ... 12/20/2011

2011 Orland Park Holiday Events | Helping Military Families at Christmas    This month our office, Keller Williams Preferred Realty, gathered together and all contributed to help our countries military families. As you walked through our office you will see Christmas Trees on each office door with various members of a military family. There was gift request from the person in the military and their family including wives and kids. Helping to bring a little more joy and happiness to these families who have sacrificed so much to keep our country safe.    The gifts ranged from something as small as a pair of socks or a hat to a gift card to a video game. It was fund to see different requests from different members.     Raymond Kennedy Keller Williams Preferred Realty Direct: 708-620-4460 12/20/2011

I usually show sales statistics in a graph form like I did here.  But our MLS offers the little pie chart below and it's interesting to see actual market status changes.  In fact, this could be titled a Market Status report.  The chart shows activity for single family Orland Park homes for the past 30 days from today's date. The Breakdown There were 31 new listings in this time frame.  I think that's pretty good for the holiday season as many sellers wait until the new year to list. There were also 21 homes that had expired listings, meaning they weren't able to sell during their listing agreement time frame.  Some of these are probably part of the 31 new listings. 13 sellers decided to make a price change, and they are usually reductions. There are 27 (hopefully happy) sellers that wer... 12/15/2011

Orland Park Homes | Current Orland Park Real Estate Statistics Orland Park Homes - The 2011 Current Data For Orland Park Homes show there were 271 Orland Park Homes closed this year and we still have a little more than half of month left to go. The good news is that compared to last year we are slightly up in numbers based off 2010 Orland Park Homes closing data which shows 266. This data comes directly from the Multiple Listing Service and is only counting Orland Park Single Family Homes not townhouses, condos or other property types. As of Dec. 13th 2011 we currently have 292 active Orland Park Homes for sale. Of those 292 active Orland Park Homes for sale there are 36 pending contracts. This is roughly about 12.3% of the current Orland Park Homes market inventory. I have supplied a c... 12/12/2011

  Orland Park Short Sales totaled 44 successful closings for the year of 2011. Of those 44 closed Orland Park Short Sales 29 of them were single family homes, 12 were townhouses or condos and 3 were were of vacant land. It is also important to note that a total number of 47 Orland Park Real Estate properties were foreclosed in 2011. This is a total of 91 distressed sales (including short sales & foreclosures).   With a total of 512 Orland Park Real Estate properties closing in 2011, this represents less than 18% of all closed sales being distressed sales up from 2010 where there was less than 15%. The good news is that Orland Park maintains a much lower level of distressed sales compared to many other surrounding areas which are showing a 30% to 50% rate of distressed sales. There is no... 12/08/2011

The other day I received an e-mail notification that a buyer I had never met wanted to make an offer on an Orland Park foreclosure home that I never showed him.  It was priced around $100,000, which is low for the village as the average sales price for homes in Orland Park for the 1st 6 months of this year was $317,157.  He was not working with another agent and he found me online. He only wanted to communicate via e-mail, which was fine with me.  However, he didn't answer some of my questions at first.  I asked him if he was a seasoned investor when he didn't seem interested in viewing the home.  I was available to show it to him, and although his phone number wasn't for the Orland Park area, he still could have been close enough to view the home.  He didn't seem interested.  He was re... 10/23/2011

Orland Park Supply & Demand - 1st Half 2011 Looking over the charts I've created in the past for homes in Orland Park, it has been evident since I started making them that there is a huge difference in the amount of homes up for sale in any given time period vs. those "lucky" sellers that received accepted contracts and those that made it to the closing table.  The word "lucky" is used tongue in cheek because most of the sellers that have sold have used more than luck.  They have priced their homes well, meaning those homes were the cream of the crop for their respective price range. I like viewing these charts as they let us know what months showed the most activity.  In 2011, May had the most homes go under contract, but January and June were about even for closings.  Even though ther... 10/06/2011

I was called to list an Oak Lawn home by someone who found my website doing a Google search.  I checked our tax records to see a photo of the home.  I was already told that it was a unique home with a combination of an original Oak Lawn "farmhouse" style blended with a couple of additions.  I love unique homes so I was excited to go on this listing presentation. The main level was pretty nice, but once I went upstairs my excitement dwindled.  The bedrooms were teeny tiny and a couple weren't even actual bedrooms per our MLS as they did not have closets.  There was a weirdly located den/family room (one of the additions), that was on a mid-level.  The basement was the most recent update and I'm not sure why they bothered.  The main "room" was more like a large hallway with another small ... 08/22/2011

I received a call one day that was from an agent that was not in our Northern IL MLS.  She wasn't even close.  But her seller insisted that she call me and offer to pay me to get his house on my website.  I was a bit flabbergasted but thought quickly. Why did he want his listing on my website?  He must have done a search, possibly for Chicago suburbs real estate, and saw my site towards the top of Google.  Natural position, not paid.  His agent said that the town the home was located in was very small, and most, if not all, of the homes were deemed historical landmarks.  I wish I could have remembered the name of the town, but I had never heard of it before.  Many current residents had come from the north, so he figured if it appeared on the home page of my website that Chicago area buy... 07/30/2011

Active Rain has now become my first stop when looking for a referral agent.  And did I get a response when I posted a buyer referral.  Some agents responded immediately and it took others a few weeks (I don't get that).  I had spent some time with a very picky buyer looking for Orland Park homes and after several showings she mentioned that she was interested in looking in Indiana.  When I say she was a picky buyer I meant she was picky with agents.  She interviewed me in my office before committing to working with me.  So I really spent some time going through the AR responses before choosing a team that I hoped she would like. I sent her their website link and she felt they would be a good match.  They sold her a home and I just received my referral check last week. Last year I receiv... 04/09/2011

The Federal Reserve released its March 15 meeting minutes Tuesday. The notes revealed a Federal Reserve split between optimism and caution for the U.S. economy. The minutes' official name is "Fed Minutes". It's a periodic publication, published 3 weeks after each meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee. The FOMC meets 8 times annually, so the Fed Minutes is published 8 times annually, too. The Fed Minutes is similar to the meeting minutes released after a condo board gets together, or after a meeting of the Board of Directors at a large corporation. The minutes give a detailed account of the important conversations and debates that occurred among the attendees. At the Federal Reserve, those conversations are deep and, as such, the minutes are long; much longer than the more well-kn... 04/06/2011

Friday is a pivotal day for mortgage markets and conforming mortgage rates across Illinois. At 8:30 AM ET, the government will release its March Non-Farm Payrolls report. More commonly known as "the jobs report", the monthly Non-Farm Payrolls is a market-mover and home buyers would do well to pay attention. Depending on the report's strength, mortgage rates could rise, or fall, by a measurable amount tomorrow morning. It's because so much of the today's mortgage market is tied to the economy, and economic growth is dependant on job growth. With more job growth, there's more consumer spending and consumer spending accounts for the majority of the U.S. economy. Additionally, it generates more payroll taxes to local, state and federal governments. This, too, puts the broader economy on mor... 03/31/2011

Standard & Poors released its Case-Shiller Index for the month of January this week. The index is a home valuation tool, measuring the monthly and annual changes in home prices in select cities nationwide. January's Case-Shiller Index gave a poor showing. As compared to December 2010, home values dropped in 19 of the Case-Shiller Index's 20 tracked markets. Only Washington, D.C. gained. The results were only modestly better on an annual basis, too. 18 of 20 markets worsened in the 12 months ending January 2011. According to the report, values are down 3.1% from last year, retreating to the same levels from Summer 2003. As a buyer or seller in today's market, though, don't read too much into it. The Case-Shiller Index is far too flawed to be the final word in housing. The index has 3 ma... 03/30/2011

On a seasonally-adjusted basis, the Pending Home Sales Index rose 2 percent last month, according to the National Association of REALTORS®. A "pending home sale" is defined as a home under contract to sell, but not yet closed. February's Pending Home Sales Index rebound breaks a 2-month losing streak, and reverses the recent downward momentum in housing. Both Existing Home Sales and New Home Sales volume showed a sizable loss last month.  For buyers and sellers of real estate in Orland Park , the Pending Home Sales Index is of particular import. It's one of the few forward-looking indicators in housing, and February's data suggests a stronger spring season than was the winter. Region-by-region, Pending Home Sales data varied: Northeast Region: -10.9% Midwest Region : +4.0% South Region... 03/29/2011

Home affordability reached an all-time high in 2010's last quarter. Unfortunately for home buyers in Illinois , it's been a different story since, however. As mortgage rates cratered, and with home values soft, the Home Opportunity Index reached its highest level in 20 years. The index is published by the National Association of Home Builders.  Close to 74 percent of the new and existing homes sold between October-December 2010 were affordable to families earning the national median income of $64,400. It's the 8th straight quarter in which the Home Affordability Index surpassed 70 percent. Prior to 2009, the HOI rarely topped 65 percent. That said, though, as with everything in real estate, home affordability is a local event. For example, take the Elkhart/Goshen area of northern India... 03/08/2011