February Market Update

Market Analysis

Market Analysis

This is our second monthly Market Update on lakefront properties, which means we can at least start to make some comparisons. We’ll get to do more of that as we collect data, and the comparisons will be more enlightening as we go.  Let’s start with the high-level summaries:

January Sales
In January, 28 lake homes sold, with a median sales price of $570,000.  
 

In January, 5 vacant lake lots sold, with a median sales price of $199,000.
 
How does that compare to last month?  I suppose we could say that vacant lot sales increased 150% (from 2 to 5) if we wanted to write a headline that grabbed your attention.  But I think it’s clear that drawing conclusions from such a small amount of data is unwise.
There are more home and condo sales to compare, but still not a lot of takeaways.  Fewer sales in January than December, but not by much.  And while the median price increased from January to February, we’re a long way from a trendline.  Below are the results:
 

February Pending Sales and Inventory:
Currently there are 48 lake homes and 7 vacant lake lots under contract.  Both of those numbers are a bit higher than January, so while the market might be predictably slow during these winter months, it hasn’t decelerated recently.

February inventory is down for homes and condos compared to January.  There are a total of 81 homes and condos for sale, 22 of which are on lakes with clarity of 10’ or more.  As you can see, inventory is down across all pricepoints.  For buyers there is less to look at.  But for sellers, I would expect desirable properties to garner a lot of interest.
 
There are 84 active vacant lot listings, only 6 (not a typo!) of which are on lakes with clarity of 10' or more.  Some of the increase from January to February is noise created by sellers re-listing property at the beginning of the new calendar year, so let’s look at just February:
 
Instead of focusing on the number of vacant lots available, I’d encourage you to think about the quality of the lakes where those lots are available.  Less than 10% (6 out of 81) of listings are on clear lakes, and there’s a good reason for that – you can’t see water clarity through ice.  Like sellers in any market, property owners are masking what might be seen as less desirable.  And purchasing those properties will work out just fine if water clarity isn’t important to you.  If it is important, we’ll be sure to talk you through the lake you’re buying as you look at properties.  We don’t want you to build a new house on a lake that isn’t right for you.

That’s it for this month, more fun data comparisons to come.  As always, give Adam or me a call if we can be of help with your property search or with the sale of your property.  Here is a quick link to Adam’s email.