MLS Stats for Pleasanton, Dublin, Pleasanton

The weekly MLS figures for San Ramon, Dublin and Pleasanton CA are in (blue=active listings, green=pending sales, purple=closed sales).

What we see is what we expect. The real estate market for San Ramon, Dublin and Pleasanton is hitting its year-end bottom.

You notice in Dublin pending sales remain stable while they have dipped in Pleasanton and San Ramon. But, in San Ramon, closed sales actually jumped up a bit.

We keep an eye on MLS listings as they expire. In the last couple of days expired listings have fallen off indicating to us that most of the downward movement of Active Listings is complete. We expect to see a rather steep increase by the second week in January as sellers return to the market. 

Our opinion – barring unforeseen circumstances, housing prices in the area are stabilizing and will remain mostly flat for the first half of the year. Sellers entering the market may still have to adjust. Buyers are going to lose the leverage they enjoyed as the market trended down. It will be back to horse trading as usual.

Relevant news items from the end of the week: 

• 30-year fixed-rate loans still remained slightly below where they were a year ago, according to a report today from Freddie Mac.
• "Mortgage rates edged up over the week following news of a jump in consumer spending in November,'' Frank Nothaft, Freddie Mac's chief economist, said in a statement. "Financial markets were concerned that stronger spending could keep inflation elevated. These worries were further compounded by the releases of new and existing home sales for the same month, which both exceeded market forecasts and caused Treasury bond yields to continue to rise.''
• The National Association of Realtors reported that sales of previously owned homes rose 0.6 percent in November to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 6.28 million units. That followed a 0.5 percent sales increase in October and marked the first back-to-back sales gains since the spring of 2005.
• Nearly 1 million California homeowners and renters can look forward to a significant reduction in their home and renter insurance rates after a decision by Farmers Insurance Group to slash premium fees in 2007.
• The National Association of Realtors reported that the median price of an existing home fell 3.5% in October from a year earlier, the largest decline since the group began collecting these data in the late 1960s. The average rate on a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage now stands at 6.16%, the lowest level since October 2005, according to HSH Associates in Pompton Plains, N.J.
• First-time buyers are particularly sensitive to rising housing costs, in part because they don't have equity from an existing home they can tap as prices shoot higher. And lower incomes provide less of a cushion when monthly payments climb. In a sign of just how hard it is for first-time buyers to come up with the cash needed to buy a home, 45% of first-time buyers bought their home with no money down, according to the recent National Association of Realtors survey, up from 43% a year earlier.

The Harper Team monitors over 50 Real Estate and News Feeds daily to bring you information pertinent to the San Ramon Valley & TriValley real estate market including the communities of Danville, San Ramon, Dublin and Pleasanton. We welcome suggestions. 

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