Do you feel like the Trivalley housing market is continually going down with homes not selling and prices dropping?  Do you feel like you see the same old homes on the market forever on your Internet home searches?  Do you feel confused that when you look at the stats that the market is actually doing well and home are selling compared to your reality?  Do you know why you are confused and your perception is off? I do.I couldn’t figure out why many of the Trivalley buyers that I am working with kept telling me that they are seeing home prices drop on the listings that I email them, while I myself am experience a much different market.  My open houses today are much busier, the phone is ring again, and I am having to deal with multiple offers again.  Why does my research show many Trivalley homes pending and selling everyday, while my buyers see prices drop on homes in their search? 

And then it hit me…I guess it depends where we are looking.  Let me explain. 

Through MLS feeds, the public (buyers in this case) can gain access to available homes on the Internet through a sundry of website such as Realtor.com.  As homes become available for sale and are posted on the MLS, buyers can search for detailed information on these homes viewing descriptions, pictures, virtual tours and property characteristics.  However, once a property goes under contract and the agent changes the status of a home to ‘Pending’ the home disappears from the list of homes that the typical buyer finds on their search results.  So what remains?

Well, if the homes in the right areas, that are priced correctly and show nicely are put into contract, marked “pending” and removed from the available list of homes which buyers can see, what does that leave the buyer viewing?  You got it!  What remains are all of the homes which aren’t under contract for whatever reason and are still sitting on the market.  Further, as these ‘rejected’ homes remain on the market and become stale, motivated sellers reduce their listing price in attempts of getting buyer’s interested in their property.  Again, the buyer will only see these stale homes with the reduced price and thus paint an inaccurate picture of how the market is doing.

To gain a true picture of how a market is doing, it is vital not to just look at what is available and active on the market, but to also look at what homes are going into contract and selling.  Following statistics such as the absorption rate of an area is a great way to better understand the true picture of a given market.

If you have any further questions or would like to receive any stats, please contact me or leave a comment.

Chris Kamali is a TriValley Real Estate Agent, helping clients buy and sell homes in Dublin, Pleasanton, San Ramon and Livermore.