Recently I mentioned that I had a listing appointment with someone who had responded to my marketing through my blogs and website.  When I met with them, they were behind on their mortgage and were thinking of simply letting the bank foreclose on their house. They wanted to know why they should try a short sale instead of letting  the bank take the home back.  After all a short sale can take several months to complete.  What was in it for them?  Why make the effort?

I pointed out that if all of the necessary steps were taken, and a successful short sale was completed, it is usually much better for the homeowner’s credit scores, and also a possible route to skipping out on a deficiency judgement.  If the homeowners are simply unwilling, or unable to work through the necessary paperwork, then the Louisville short sale simply won’t take place.

If you’d like more information on Louisville Short Sales or short sales in general, please make sure to visit my website and I’ll be happy to answer your questions.

Here is this week’s installment of the chart I get asked about the most, but is the most difficult to explain:  The Median Market Action Index.  Today I will discuss the Action Index for the Highlands neighborhood of Louisville, or at least the zip codes of 40204 and 40205, which cover homes for sale in the Highlands.  First, keep in mind, that since I am looking at two zip codes, there will be two lines on the graph, and don’t necessarily have to be doing the same thing!  The most important thing to remember is that 30 represents a neutral market (which we haven’t seen in some time!) and anything below 30 is a buyer’s market, with the further below 30 we go, the stronger the buyer’s market it is.  With all of that said, here is the graph:

Louisville Highlands Real Estaet Market Index

Back in May, we had a really short surge in home sales and activity, enough to push us into a Seller’s market.  But it appears that was simply an aberation, since we were back to a buyer’s market in just a week or two!  Since that point, it appears that both zip codes have been spending most of their time in between 15 and 20 on the Market Action Index, which is pretty solidly in a buyer’s market.  Let’s keep an eye on these numbers and see if they don’t start to dip a bit as we enter the fall selling season, a traditionally slower part of the year.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to visit the most complete website about homes for sale Louisville at www.GregFly.com.  You can also call me anytime at 1-888-GREG-FLY or email me at greg@gregfly.com.

For homes for sale in Louisville Highlands, DOM is rising while home inventory levels are dropping, just a bit.  As I look over available data for the zip codes of 40204 and 40205, I noticed that the inventory levels for both zip codes, which basically make up the Highlands area of Louisville, have fallen off, just a bit.  In the past week, it looks like 40205 lost about 15 homes out of inventory, while 40204 lost only a few homes.  It will be interesting to see if this reduction in home inventory results in closings or if a few sellers have simply gotten frustrated and taken their house off the market.

Louisville Highlands Real Estate Inventory

Also of interest is how long homes currently for sale in the Highlands have been on the market.  In the graph below, you can see that the time on the market has been on a fairly steady rise, and the past few weeks don’t seem to be bucking the trend.  Instead, it appears that in the past week, there was a pretty good size jump in just how long homes have been on the market.

Louisville Highlands Real Estate Days On Market

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to visit the most complete website about homes for sale Louisville at www.GregFly.com.  You can also call me anytime at 1-888-GREG-FLY or email me at greg@gregfly.com.

The percentage of home owners in the Louisville market reducing their asking price is trending higher.  I have provided a chart that graphs two different trending lines measuring how many homes owners in the Louisville real estate market are reducing their asking prices.  The gold, smoother line, is a  90 day rolling average, while the black line uses only a 7 day average.

Louisville Real Estate price decreases

As you can see, the 90 day rolling average shows the overall trend is that more and more home sellers in Louisville are reducing their home asking prices, even as the 7 day average shows perhaps the smallest of reductions.  Let’s look at the bigger picture:  since April, when this chart starts, about 30.5% of all home owners in Louisville had reduced their asking price.  Now, six months later, about 37% percent of all homes on the market have had a price reduction.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to visit the most complete website about Louisville real estate at www.GregFly.com.  You can also call me anytime at 1-888-GREG-FLY or email me at greg@gregfly.com.

On Mondays of each week, I spend a little time to review the numbers for homes for sale in Louisville.  This is data for active homes, not sold homes.  We have a couple of variables to play with, which might be affecting our numbers a bit, such as the $8,000 tax credit running out, and we are heading into fall, which is traditionally a slower market.  For what it is worth, here is a chart showing the trending homes prices for Louisville real estate.

Louisville real estate home prices

As you can see, from both lines above, the 90 day trending line is decreasing, showing downward movement over the past three months.  If you look at the black line, which is what truly  happened within the past 7 days, you will see that the median price for all of Louisville real estate went from about $165,000 to $163,000.  So it is apparent, that due to the possibility of many factors, there is some downward pressure on pricing for Louisville homes for sale, and we may not be at the bottom yet.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to visit the most complete website about homes for sale Louisville at www.GregFly.com.  You can also call me anytime at 1-888-GREG-FLY or email me at greg@gregfly.com.

I have an appointment coming up with a homeowner who has fallen behind on their mortgage. They have  asked me if their bank will agree to a short sale.

The answer depends on the situation and sometimes which bank their mortgage is with. Banks use short sales to avoid the foreclosure process. The foreclosure process takes longer and can cost banks far more money then the loss they write off as a result of a short sale. There are however several criteria that must be met before the bank will approve a short sale.  So I will need to collect more info from these home sellers to see if a Louisville Short Sale will be the best path for them to take.

If you’d like more information on Louisville Short Sales or short sales in general, please make sure to visit my website and I’ll be happy to answer your questions.

I have some great pictures available for a new construction J’Town condo development.  The Magnolia Place development, of which I am not the listing agent, is all brick and located just off of Six Mile Lane in J’Town.  A couple of friends of mine are the developers and builders, and I just wanted to pass along some of their info.  Most of the units are two bedrooms with a price around $125,000, which is well below the average price of condos for sale in J’Town.  If you would like more information, please visit their property website at www.Magnolia-Place-Condos.com.

Frequently, on a listing appointments, I run into home owners who owe as much on their house as the likely sales price.  And the question invariably comes up, “What is a short sale?”

A short sale in Louisville has nothing to do with being a quick sale.  The process is not short!  A short sale occurs when a homeowner needs to sell their home and owes more then it is currently worth.  With some luck, and a lot of work,the bank  agrees to accept less then what is owed as payment, in order to avoid a foreclosure, which can take even longer and cost the bank quite a bit more.

If you’d like more information on Louisville Short Sales or short sales in general, please make sure to visit my website and I’ll be happy to answer your questions.

Almost 40% of all homes for sale in Prospect have reduced their price at some point in the past six months.  I know that sounds bad, but keep in mind there are some parts of town that have over 50% of homes with price reductions.  However, even if some parts of the Louisville real estate market may be in worse shape, that doesn’t help Prospect home owners.  I will be interested to watch as we go forward to see if more and more home owners reduce their asking price to keep up with the other sellers who are lowering prices, or if some owners have more staying capabilities and can afford to wait longer to sell than some other, lower priced, areas of town.

Homes For Sale In Prospect - Price Reductions

Here’s one more graph for Prospect real estate, and then I will leave you alone for another week, at least as far as Prospect is concerned.  This chart is the Median Market Action Index, and shows whether or not we are in a buyers or sellers market.  Prospect is still well within a buyers market, but you can see that the movement is up, which is getting us closer to a neutral market, if not exactly a sellers market.  However, with the first time home buyer’s program running down, and move up buyers on the decline, along with seasonal changes, I wouldn’t hold my breath that this trend will continue, and would actually expect to see a further movement into the strong buyer’s market territory.

Homes For Sale In Prospect Action Index

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to visit the most complete website about homes for sale Louisville at www.GregFly.com.  You can also call me anytime at 1-888-GREG-FLY or email me at greg@gregfly.com.