Imperfect blogs and Park County’s strong real estate market.
Oct 16th, 2007 by Gillian
When I was working to build this web site, I loved the idea of a real estate blog, thinking it would be a terrific way to voice my thoughts and opinions on all matters real estate, spread the news about great buys, and generally provide a place where people knew they could find information and insight about Park County’s market.
I forgot, however, that I am a perfectionist. I forgot, entirely, that I am a writer as well as a RE Broker, and that words are important to me — how they sound and how they look, as well as what they say.
I also forgot that sometimes my work life is so busy that I am surprised and alarmed by the contents of the refrigerator at home, and only see my family when they’re asleep. Like so many of us, I have little spare time, and yet I really want to make this work.
It seems to me that writing a blog is like going out on a date when you have five minutes to get ready instead of a couple of hours — I never liked that much, either. So, my committment is to make more blog entries, more often.
OK. Onto the really good news. While working to educate an out of state buyer last week, I pulled up some statistics for her about sales activity in Park County, and was delighted with what I saw. While the rest of the nation’s real estate woes continue, we here in south west Montana have prices that have not dropped.. Take a look at these numbers, pulled from our local MLS:
PERIOD OF TIME AVERAGE SALES PRICE MEDIAN SALES PRICE NUMBER OF SALES
10/03 - 10/04 $173,701 $130,000 261
10/04 - 10/05 $225,835 $154,000 321
10/05 - 10/06 $236,905 $187,000 293
10/06 - 10/07 $241,229 $190,000 226
People think that prices have dropped in the area, but this is mainly true for list prices, not sales prices. Many homes have been on the market for a long time, with original list prices that were chosen to match the overheated market of 05/06, and just missed the curve, and were too high to begin with; these are the prices that have dropped.
Of course these statistics are broad strokes — more and less expensive homes sold, and certainly market activity is not as busy as it has been. Many sellers have sold for less than they had originally expected. Nonetheless, these numbers show without question, that our market is holding its own at a time when other areas are struggling with tremendous loss in value.
Check back tomorrow for a superb new Livingston listing, with some of the areas most remarkable views..
