Salt Lake City Home Sales - September 2007

October 13th, 2007

Salt Lake home prices peaked in July and then started their decline. The home value pressure caused by the current mortgage crisis finally took its toll on our Salt Lake real estate market.

September homes sales dropped to 186 homes & condos sold which is even lower than the average sales in January, the slowest month of the year. The number of active listings increased to 1,806 listings. The result of the growing home inventory and declining sales is an is an absorption rate of 9.7 months. That is a 4% increase in time on market over the August rate of 6.8 months. Check out the September Absorption Rates by city here.

Salt Lake City - September Home Sales

Month Average Sold Price Change from Prior Year # of Homes Sold Change from Prior Year Absorption Rate in Months
July $357,434 +27.7% 254 +.8% 6.8
August $344,788 +14.3% 272 -7.5% 6.8
September $311,271 +6.9% 186 -23.5% 9.7

The Salt Lake City real estate market is pretty consistent with the Salt Lake County results. Sales were slowing but were still doing ok until September. In September homes sales plummeted! Why?

Salt Lake County - September 2007 Home Sales

Month Average Sold Price Change from Prior Year # of Homes Sold Change from Prior Year Absorption Rate in Months
July $311,576 +11.1% 1,269 -5.2% 6.6
August $316,151 +10.3% 1,294 -12.2% 7.0
September $300,066 +6.2% 848 -34.2% 11.0

The mortgage crisis reached its peak in September. Prior to that we heard fears of increased foreclosures and falling prices. But in September Countrywide announced anticipated layoffs of 12,000 people and Merrill Lynch released their downgrade of Countrywide. For more on Countrywide and its impact on the market check here.

Even more impact was felt in September with tightening loan restrictions and the vanishing “stated-income” loans. Buyers suddenly had to have a down-payment to buy a home. Some buyers had been pre-approved and were a week away from closing when their lender informed them the loan they were approved on was no longer offered. If they couldn’t come-up with some “down payment” they could not close the loan. It was a tough month with rumors of 50% or more of purchases falling apart.

Have we seen the worst of it? Will things ease up through fall and during the winter months?

If you’re interested in information on any particular zipcode or neighborhood just contact us at 801–582–5882 or at Ask The Broker.

Information for our stats were taken from WFRMLS as of 10/13/2007 and are subject to change at the discretion of the web-master. Zipcodes included for Salt Lake City include 84101, 84102, 84103, 84104, 84105, 84106, 84108, 84109, 84111, 84116.

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