Hi…. This is Tom Olsewski with Coldwell Banker and Team Olsewski. Wow we are all done with the 1st quarter of 2019. This is the Temecula real estate market update. So in this Video I will be providing detailed updates on how the Temecula Real Estate Market ended up for 1st quarter 2019 over all and to give you some insight on what the experts are saying the rest of the 2019 Real Estate market will be looking like.
Temecula Real Estate market remains steady and is still in a sellers market. Not a crazy sellers market like we saw spring of 2018 but still strong with only 3 months of inventory and homes selling in about 33 days if priced right. There is a lot of blatantly wrong and misleading information going on in the news. I was going to cover it in this video but there is a lot to go over so I will have a separate video covering this misinformation being provided by our news media. As I had stated previously if anything it’s a better market to buy and sell. Let’s see how the overall real Estate market looked for the 1st quarter of 2019 overall and take a look at this last quarter year over year.
So how is 2019 shaping up so far? Basically…..Steady as we go……. it should be very similar to what we saw last quarter in 2018 the experts are saying. Inventory is rising slightly but days on the market has been decreasing as there are still buyers out there looking to buy.
So lets see what the detailed numbers look like here in Temecula. First we will look at the closed sales in Temecula for the year. In March 2019 there were a total of 162 closed sales in the city of Temecula of all price ranges and types of homes. This compares to 181 closed sales in March 2018 which is a year over year decrease of about 10.5%. The number of sales has had a big jump starting in February as we get into the yearly seasonal increase as we move further into the spring selling season. The two biggest segments that had declining sales are under $500k to $799k down 29% year over year and under $300k down 25% (Just not as many homes in Temecula under $300k anymore) and the biggest surprise came in the over 800k price range as this segment has previously struggled but had 16 total homes selling in March up 77.8% year over year.
Next we will look at the number of active listings. I have a slide on this to show the spike in listings. As of March 31st there were 537 active listings in the city of Temecula which is up from 427 the previous year increasing 25.8%. This has climbed slightly all quarter long and the under 300,000 segment had the largest growth at a 200% increase year over year but this is only 12. It is important to understand this number so if you want to sell your home it has to look great to get top dollar with the additional competition. We can help with that and if you go out to our new Video Blog I have a video covering what top five things you can do to get top dollar when you sell.
The Next important number we will look at is how many months supply of listings do we have in Temecula? This along with the number sales indicates what type of market we have today. Where are we in ending up the first quarter of 2019. Are we still in sellers market or was there a shift? Well the data today shows 3.3 months of inventory available for buyers. With the neutral point being 6 months we are definitely still in a sellers marketplace overall just not a crazy sellers market like we had 1st and second quarters of last year. Because of the diverse types of property we have here in Temecula there is a difference depending on what segment you are interested in. The two bookends of opposite ends are the 300k to $499k segment that only has 2 months supply making it for a very tight segment for buyers. The other end of the spectrum is the over $800k segment that has 11.6 months supply an increase of 63.4% making this segment a very strong buyers market. If you have questions about your specific neighborhood or home please give me a call or send an email and I can give you specifics for your area and home.
Are home values still increasing here in Temecula? The median sales price for March in Temecula overall is $451,000. This compares to the beginning of 2019 where the median sales price was $450,000. This shows about -4% decrease year over year. Again it is important to know that this combines all types of homes and price points. This overall number has a big dependency with how many lower priced homes and higher priced homes sell. The biggest segment drop was the over $800k segment decreasing 19.6% year over year. The 300k to 799k seqment had just minimal decreases. It is different for different areas within Temecula with a large number of brand new homes, ranch and older homes. Housing growth will still maintain a 3.8% growth rate nationally in 2019 the experts are predicting and even if we should see an economic slow down in 2020 home values are still predicted to increase in value 2.5%.
So just to show that the market is still strong…… here are the numbers pertaining to the percentage of sales price to original list price. Homes overall in Temecula sold at 97.9% overall down slightly by 1.1%. In general, I’m seeing if a home is not in great shape its going to sell for less. There is enough inventory now where buyers have a choice. Every home regardless of the year built has a completely updated price and a needs work price or somewhere in between.
The next number to be aware of is the number of days a home stays on the market before selling. For Temecula at the end of March the number was 33 days. This number reflects a large 153.8% increase year over year. This is the difference between the lower inventory last year and more homes on the market this quarter!
The last item I wanted to quickly provide an update on is how our mortgage rates are currently looking. Rates have actually decreased this first quarter of 2019.Recent rates are floating around 4.25% for 30 yr fixed, FHA/VA is at 4.0% depending on the lender…. Down slightly. Rates have not increased like to experts were thinking they would this year so far but they are expected to rise slightly in 2019. The fed is predicting at least 3 rate hikes for 2019 and although these hikes do not directly reflect mortgage rates….. I’m hearing white house pressures have been keeping rates down to keep the economy stimulated. So if you have been thinking about upsizing or downsizing and need a loan this spring is the best time to sell before rates go up.
I hope this update has been helpful! If you have been thinking about buying or selling and would like more information, please feel free to contact me directly at 951-506-5744 or email at [email protected]. There will be a slide at the end of this video on ways to contact us. The bottom line as I see it is it’s a great time to buy and sell with still low interest rates and more inventory to pick from when buying. Last year I heard from many sellers that they were worried they couldn’t find anything to buy if they sold some of them tried and took their home off the market when they couldn’t find what they wanted. Now is the time to revisit this and make the move.
This is Tom Olsewski with Team Olsewski and Coldwell Banker signing out……………Make it a great day!
