Let’s look at the numbers
Friday, December 12, 2008
Sometimes numbers tell the story best.
Last week I received the actual number of homes sold by foreclosure in Butte County for October, 2008. Here is a recap of the year-to-date:
| January | 26 |
| February | 67 |
| March | 51 |
| April | 68 |
| May | 55 |
| June | 81 |
| July | 90 |
| August | 110 |
| September | 97 |
| October | 63 |
I was pleased that the numbers seem to be declining. Economic forecasters had told me that August 2008 would be the peak, due to the large number of mortgage resets. I am hopeful that they were right.
With all the new programs in place to help homeowners stay in their homes, I think we have good reason to believe the worst is behind us.
The numbers shown above reflect all of Butte County. Less than 25 percent of these homes are in Chico. If you want to buy one of the homes, you will find that very few are still for sale.
Other numbers that bode well for Chico: The current number of single family homes actively for sale has been declining. With a high of over 400 homes in October, we are now down to just 337. That is also well below the same week a year ago, when we had 381 homes for sale.
Stability is by far the best indicator that Chico is OK. The number of homes for sale fluctuated between 311 and 405, but stayed mostly between 350 and 375, which is a very nice range for a population base of 100,000 people.
The number of houses for sale may even be on the low side.
I would be concerned if I didn’t know that there are sellers who are holding off listing their homes for a while. And there are many buyers waiting as well.
The number of homes selling has been lower than a normal year. As confidence returns to the real estate market, the volume of sales will increase. Chico has all the right factors for the return of a healthy real estate market.
