Tuesday, July 24, 2012

Looking for area school information?

If you are looking for information on local schools?  FREE info here:

http://chriswood.viewcincinnatihomes.com/mischool/zip/45140/

The quality of a school can greatly influence home values in an area. On this page you'll find detailed information on school districts, school ratings, test scores by grade, student-teacher ratio, and much more.

Saturday, July 21, 2012

Homes for Sale in Cincinnati - Is NOW the time to list your home?

Looking to do some research on your own - no worries, Visit HERE for some free local info.

12 months of positive numbers!  How sweet it is!  Not everywhere is performing like a rock star, but many places are seeing sustained improvements in units sold as well as avg price.  Cincinnati as a whole is looking like a pretty sweet place to buy a house!

Let's start with a look at the Inventory:


The Red line being 2012 we can see that overall in Cincinnati, Inventory is quite low.  Many sellers continue to sit out the market in a "wait and see" position.  This creates a curious potential for having significantly low inventory amounts as we push out the end of the year.  If this trend continues, it great news for sellers - low inventory creates stronger pricing and the occasional bidding wars over properties...you remember those right?

Next a quick peek at Home Sales:

Here is where we start to see some real goodness - Don't you just love the way that red line continues in an upward fashion?  Now, as you can see 2010 that sudden drop into July.  This is due to that wonderful tax credit that came to an end - once finished, it closed out a quiet and depressing year.  I do expect our numbers to dip through July, and I believe there is a good chance that we may see a dip below 2011 numbers for sales.  It's bound to happen some time and we shouldn't panic - folks are settling in and getting ready for school to start - once the inventory bumps up we will watch that line rise again.

As for Average Prices:

Now here we're jumping quite nicely.  Not so good news for buyers - especially those who have been "waiting for the bottom".  That never works out well - as you can see by this chart, the bottom was in February of 2012 and we have continued up ever since.  I apply this mostly to the lack of inventory - supply and demand...simple stuff as long as you have a supply of what people are demanding.

So based on this information - if you have been thinking about selling your home in Cincinnati area - NOW is the time to get that puppy on the market!  Give me a call, email or text and I'll be happy to help you figure out what the market is willing to pay for your home.  But if you are looking to do some research on your own, check out this great resource.


Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Homes for Sale in Loveland, Ohio

A quick peek at homes for sale in Loveland Ohio shows us that things are starting to move along however, it also shows us that we will likely continue a trend of ups and downs.  Loveland Ohio is particularly interesting as it's median list price continues to be well above its median sales price.

We seem to be getting further apart as the summer goes on.  So what is driving this trend?  We have to go back to the old stand by of supply and demand.  An increasing number of homes coming on the market with decreasing number of buyers.  This translates into a 90.3% drop in sales posted from the previous month.  (Mind you - that number will adjust as we approach the end of July...but OUCH!)


Also, you can see that there are few distressed properties in Loveland.  This has helped sellers maintain their asking prices, however, buyers have continued to press those prices down, as the move from market area to market area.  Keep watching these numbers as we approach the end of summer and we will likely see that asking price fall dramatically.

Thursday, July 12, 2012

Looking for Open Houses This weekend?

Are you headed out to find open houses this weekend?  Are you armed? - I mean, with the proper tools of course.  Here - take a couple of tools of mine that you can use for FREE.

While you're our, go to starone.com on your mobile phone browser and you can use our web app.  Smart and intuitive it can help you locate open houses near you and provide you with some needed directions on how to get there.
It's very simple to use and can help you search for any home - not just the ones being held open.  The best part, is that there is nothing to install so it doesn't take up space on your phone and it interacts with your favorite mapping apps already on your phone.












For a quick tutorial on how to use this service - just watch the video below and see it in Action!


So good luck this weekend!  Don't go out unarmed or unprepared.  And if you have questions, please shoot me a text, email or give me a call!  I'm glad to help.

Chris W.

New Website with Better Search Features!

If you are looking for homes for sale in Cincinnati, Ohio I have a site for you!  I am currently in the process of launching a new website with far better search features and more timely information.  This new site will be directly tied to our local MLS so that when new listings come on the market, or current listings have changes or updates you can be notified immediately.

I will begin asking folks to register on my site - mainly this is to help me stay in touch with my clients.  And honestly, the information is so good I had to ask for something.  All you need to register is your name and email and you can start to receive listings emailed to you as they come on the market.

Because this site is tied with our MLS, I can also provide much more accurate information about neighborhood sales, trends and market information.

Go Ahead...Give it a try:


Thursday, July 5, 2012

Home Sales Continue to outperform in May


Locally we're having a not so bad year...overall.  These numbers we are going to look at represent the whole of the Cincinnati area market.  So overallwe're not doing so badly.  Locally, however, we continue to see small local communities struggling with real estate.  First of all a comment from the Cincinnati Area Board of Realtors:
"May marked the 11th consecutive month where local home sales improved over a year ago. May
sales of 1,901 units -- a 14.17% gain over the same month a year ago -- is the highest number of monthly
sales since June 2010.  Year-to-date sales (Jan. through May) are up 10.31% from a year ago."
That's big picture viewing right there and it's not a bad thing at all.  It shows that we are moving in the right direction, likely spurred on by extremely low interest rates and I expect those rates will hold more or less for a bit longer.
Looking at our stats for Cincinnati Home sales in May of 2012 we get this picture:
We continue to see those "+" signs that EVERYONE loves to see.  It's a slow and steady bout of positive...but we like the steady part!

I do loves me some charts!
So if you are thinking about putting your home on the market - NOW may be a good time to have a professional consultation in regards to how your local market is doing...and how your home would compare to what is currently for sale and sold. Give me a call for more information - I'm glad to help.