Real Estate Information Archive

Buiilding a home is always a risky business. You have hundreds of decisions to make and more often than not you have to make decisions that you may 2nd guess a day later. As Louisville Real Estate Agents we work with hundreds of clients a year. When we started working with Rebecca and Joe last year we first looked at older homes. But soon our client’s attentions turned to building and buying a Ball Home. Today after a 5-month period, we closed on Joe and Rebecca’s new Ball home in Cooper Farms and we are thrilled for them. In fact watch the faces on this couple; their excitement is really contagious.

You can waste a lot of time looking for a home on your own. Driving around calling signs can take time. May internet websites take several days to load hot properties and by then a great home could be under contract. Save time and money working with the right Real Estate Team.

We need your help! We had 55 listings here in Louisville Kentucky in December 2008 and we're now down to 30 Listings. Thanks to our marketing we're selling homes in this slower economy but we need more. Yes we were ranked 7Th in 2008 for sales among the 4100 real estate agents in Louisville, but we want to do better. Take a look at what we do, it's all about eyeballs.

Louisville Area Homes and Condos continue to sell. We just wrote another contract for a local woman who had been living in an apartment. You can see the excitment in her face as we complete the contract. That's what I love about this buisness.. helping people realize their dreams. 

Home sales are picking up in Louisville Kentucky! As an agent we need to be available to our clients 24/7. In our continuing Live Blog series we're working hard to make our clients happy. In this report we talk to Adam, who had 2 offers on his home in a matter of a couple of days.

Home sales pick up in Louisville Kentucky - Adam on the phone from Bob Sokoler on Vimeo.

As Home Sales go (both Louisville Kentucky and the rest of the country)... so does the economy! It's true. So what do we need to get home sales back to normal? As part of our Live Video Blog Series, my partners and I talked about the problem 1/9/2009. For more information about us head to www.weselllouisville.com

We always wonder how we performed as a Real Estate team. Now that we have a video portion to our blog I decided to ask clients. Sure they know they're on camera but I think a viewer could tell if clients are being forced to say something they don't believe in. :

Looking back at the month of December 2008 shows some areas of town performing well even is this slower economy. The sales figures below show that lower priced homes continue to sell if priced correctly. Still many point to the Louisville Kentucky Housing Market as an island of stable home prices compared to much of the rest of the nation. One report on the website Reed Construction Data says “Buffalo, Dallas, Houston and Louisville are representative of local housing markets that largely avoided the home price bubble and the ensuing bursting of the bubble.”.

Writer Jim Haughey is right on the money. Louisville continues to be a good investment.

01-Dec-2008 - 31-Dec-2008

                     Residential Unit Sales        Total   Unit Sales

                      0-2        3         4+      Resid     Condo/    Total

 PRICE CLASS/TYPE    Bedrm     Bedrm     Bedrm     Sales     Co-Op     Units

 $29,999 OR UNDER      30        14         8        52         0        52

 $30,000 -  $39,999    10         6         2        18         1        19

 $40,000 -  $49,999     6         4         1        11         0        11

 $50,000 -  $59,999     2        11         1        14         0        14

 $60,000 -  $69,999     5         5         2        12         5        17

 $70,000 -  $79,999     8         2         3        13         3        16

 $80,000 -  $89,999     2        12         2        16         5        21

 $90,000 -  $99,999     2        18         4        24         5        29

$100,000 - $119,999     5        32         9        46        17        63

$120,000 - $139,999     7        24         2        33         6        39

$140,000 - $159,999     2        27         5        34         4        38

$160,000 - $179,999     1        20         3        24         2        26

$180,000 - $199,999     2        14         9        25         6        31

$200,000 - $249,999     0        25        26        51         6        57

$250,000 - $299,999     0         6        11        17         1        18

$300,000 - $399,999     0         5        17        22         2        24

$400,000 - $499,999     0         3         7        10         0        10

$500,000 OR OVER        0         1        11        12         0        12

Total Types:           82       229       123       434        63       497

Average Price:     $57,444  $139,386  $272,269  $161,564  $135,703  $158,286

Median Price:     $127,500  $127,500  $220,000  $124,869  $117,500  $122,000

Average DOM:           60        77        85        76       102        79

Average CDOM:          74        90       128        98       143       103

The news is not earthshaking! New home sales numbers for December 2008 are just out for Louisville and they are as you might expect.  The number of homes sold was down 25% from December 2007.  Still, look at this a different way, 718 homes sold in December 2008, (compared to 964 in December 2007), means homes are selling.  What buyers are looking for is a stable economy, deals and great interest rates.  Many believe a new administration will stabilize the economy and allow the lower home prices and interest rates to do their job.   

What sellers need now more than ever is to correctly price their home and then marketing that includes high quality pictures and video TV stories about the home to bring in buyer eyeballs.  The Louisville Courier-Journals’ Alex Davis recently wrote a story about aggressive marketing and included us and 2 of our successful sellers in 2008 (Lori Dougherty and Robert and Adele Koch). You can read that story here. 

The average sales price of a home was down about $15,000 from a year before. But remember, included in that number are 202 foreclosures/short sales which were sold at anywhere between 10 and 50 percent below market value. 

It’s the foreclosures and short sales that are forcing down area prices here in Louisville and around the United States. Of the buyers out in the market this new years day, many are looking for bargains and believe a foreclosure or short sale is the place to get them. Unfortunately, once buyers get in to see a home in foreclosure and realize the work needed to return the home back to a livable condition, the deal is not as good as once thought! 

The good news for home buyers (and sellers) right now are interest rates.  As of this writing rates for a 30-year fixed mortgage were 5 percent. A 15-year fixed mortgage was hovering at 4.75. As we move into 2009, many believe the lower rates will motivate buyers to make a purchase. 

We love first time buyers! This week after several months of looking for a home, negotiating the best contract and then repairs our first time Louisville Kentucky buyer is on the road to closing. Our client picked one of the most gorgeous homes in one of the top neighborhoods in the Louisville area. The 78 year old Highlands home had just about completely restored. But an inspection found a number of items that still needed some work. To our buyers credit she was patient and let us go through the normal negotiating process for the repairs. The seller on the other side was also an agent and knew the value of her home. Yet through calm negotiations on both sides an agreement for repairs was reached this past week and we’re on to closing.

We love stories like this, our first time home buyer has worked hard over the past years to save enough money to put a good size down payment on the home. She has searched for the perfect home for a while and now she’s found it. We’ll return to the home with our inspector before closing to confirm all repairs have been made. We want to make sure our client has nothing but happiness in her new home! Seeing our clients smile really makes our job enjoyable!