Looking back over the last six months two thirds of my real estate sales have been short sales! As of today, in the Metrolist Multiple Listing Service (which services the Sacramento metro area), 50% of all homes on the market are listed as short sales!
This equates to 9,836 homes that, if sold at their listing price, represent over $2 billion in real estate. This is a staggering number! The number of bank owned properties (REOs) in the area total 2,962 homes and represent approximately $550 million in property values. That’s only about one-quarter of the short sales!
Don’t be deceived by these numbers, however! While at this point in time there are 4 times as many short sales on the market as there are REOs, the sales volume so far this year for REOs has topped 12,756 homes and over $2.2 billion. This means that bank owned properties come on the market and are sold quickly. Short sale properties linger on the market forever while they work their way through the complex and bureaucratic approval process that the lenders put you through.
Short sale listings are more expensive than bank owned properties too! The average short sale listing is priced at about $205,000 while bank owned listings average $185,000.
What about homes for sale that are not REOs or short sales? There 7,000 of them on the market today with an average price of $425,000. The bargains are clearly with the short sales and REOs!
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