We are looking at the month of May and what has closed. The number of sales is slightly down from where it was last year, which is not particularly surprising. That’s kind of where we’ve been in the last few months because of the higher interest rates. There are fewer buyers who can afford to buy right now, but we’re talking about maybe an 800-sales difference, so that’s not drastic. When we look at the number of listings, we are seeing that the number of listings is higher than last year, but again, not by much. We’re at about 5,100 listings available in the area, and last year was just under 4,000. So we still have a discrepancy if you think about it: over 3,000 homes are selling, and we’ve got about 5,000 listings. Therefore, we have 1.5 to 1.6 months of inventory available, which is still considered a seller’s market. That means sellers have more negotiating power than in a traditionally normal market.

We haven’t been in one of those in a while, so sellers might feel a difference compared to if their friend sold a year ago. They might have experienced a different market where they received 20 offers, appraisal gaps, and all of these things to get offers accepted. However, it is still a great time to be a seller. The average sales price is higher than it was last year. The one thing that we did notice this month that we haven’t seen in a long time is that the median sales price is down slightly. It’s about half a percent lower than it was last year. That’s the first time we’ve seen the median sales price go below, or I should say, go down. It has been all positive for years and years, so we’ll keep our eye on that. But based on the number of pending sales happening, the activity that we’re feeling, we’ll probably see that go back up next month. This is that leveling off that we talked about a few months ago, where no one’s really expecting the market to have some major crash or anything like that. Although I know the headlines might make you think that sometimes, the prices are probably going to level off a little bit because we were in a very hot seller’s market for so long. It’s only natural that things are going to kind of even out a little bit. But as far as the market goes, the average days to get things sold is about 45 days, which is still historically extremely low. Prices are very strong. And as a seller, we are still seeing multiple offers across the board on almost every listing in and around the average price point of $450,000 or below. You’re still seeing multiple offers; it just may take a week or so to see them happen, whereas before it would be day one. I think everybody can agree that that’s still a very strong market.

If you need to sell a house, as far as buying goes, you might have a little bit more negotiating power to get repair credits, things like that, whereas a few years ago, that was just gone. You know, you really couldn’t renegotiate because the buyer already had backup contracts and all that stuff. So, you have a little bit more negotiating power in terms of credits towards closing costs or repairs during the process, but during the initial offer process, you still may experience multiple offers on something that’s brand new to the market, in good condition, and priced at that $450,000 or under price range.

If you have a real estate need, there are always opportunities for buyers, sellers, and investors. I think this is a great market if you need to buy and sell at the same time. There’s more opportunity to do that than there has been in the last three or four years. It’s been really challenging if you needed to buy a new home and sell yours at the same time, but that’s changing. So if you have any real estate needs, give us a call, and we’ll walk you through because every market, every neighborhood is all local. So what you’re hearing me say is for all of Orlando, but your neighborhood could be in a completely different market. Therefore, we want to analyze what your needs are in your specific market and make the best decision for you and your family.

Give us a call if you have any real estate needs at 407-982-7240.