My Blog

It not take as long as I thought to rebound. Last month Pending contracts were down 20% from last year. This month we are only down 6.9% from last year, 744 compared to 799 last year. Last year was a record setting year too. We are ahead of the previous four years in contracts pending for this time of year. April was down 8.4% in closed sales from last April, with 34 fewer closing than last April. Not bad at all being the situation we face this year and that we were down 20% in contracts.
Inventory is down as well. especially in the lower price ranges. There are only six active listings under $150,000 at the time of this report. None in the $100,000 to $125,000 price range. All absorption rates under $200,000 is less that one month and most are just days to two weeks. 

Click here for April 2020 Preston Report

March was another good Month with 415 closed transactions, the best for years. Up 35 from last March. We are 93 transaction ahead of last years Year to date sales through March. up 10.4% from last years record setting year. But as you suspect, the trend will not go on. With the stay at home policy for Covid-19 our pending contracts are down. But they are not as bad as i would have thought. 594 pending contracts at this time. that is down 131 contracts from last month and down 157 from last March. but only down 29 from 2018. People are still out buying, but in a very different way. I missed my first closing in 32 years, because only buyer and sellers were allowed in he building. I had to wait in parking lot if there was a problem, and did not even go to my last one. When we are able to get back out full steam, we should see some big numbers, i have people waiting to buy and put their homes up for sale until this passes. 

New homes pending contracts are down about the same amount. from 253 in February to 200 in March. one good thing is we all should be catching upon paperwork. there were 13 new closings for January and February that were not there when i searched last month. Guess they had time to enter them. All new homes but one. Everyone stay safe and hope this comes to an end soon. And when it does make sure you have your running shoes on because we will be busy.

Click here for March 2020 Preston Report

February 2020 was up 10% from last years record numbers and an increase of 8% for year to date sales. So we started off great for 2020.

It will be interesting to see what the next few months will bring with everyone following the precautions for the Coronavirus. I have had many calls and emails asking me what the numbers are because of it. We will not see how that effects us until April or even May. March should still be good for closing because they were under contract in Early February or most in January, having a 30 to 45 day average closing time. Pending contracts are up right now, Listings are up so not that many have taken their homes off the market so far. Next month will give a better picture of how this effects the real estate market. Could be a total shut down, depending on some actions that have been talked about. Hopefully this will not take long. Everyone take care and be safe.

Click here for The February 2020 Preston Report

January 2020 is like most January's. a slow start compared to the rest of the year. 225 closed transaction of which 53 were new homes. Slightly up from last year with 14 more closings. 
Pendings are up to 622 contracts waiting to close. the previous four years have run between 540 and 570 for January. Hopefully that is a sign. 41 of those pending are between $500,000 and $700,000, a strong start.
Double digit pendings over a million dollars with 11 contracts, and 4 of those are new homes. That may the highest we have had for new homes in seven figures. But even with four pendings, our active inventory did not change from new ones coming on the market, or a price change to move them into that category.

Here is the big news. This is starting the 21st year of doing this report, and the active inventory for January is the lowest it has ever been, with 1003 active listings. The lowest month before this was January 2005 with 1051. It has been hard to find homes in the lower price ranges and will be more so this year. It will be interesting to see what inventory does as the year rolls on. Even with the drop overall in active listings the top five price ranges did not change much. Like the $500,000 to $700,000, even with the jump to 41 pending contracts I talked about, the active listings went up by 3. So enough new ones came on the market to replenished the ones we sold plus a couple extras.

New homes had a usual January Closing month, but pendings are strong. Accounting for over a third of total pending contracts.

Click here for January 2020 Preston Report

We finished the year for Edmond, Deer Creek and Oakdale School systems with 4714 closed Residential Closings! which is 304 more transactions than last year for an increase of 7%!!! Way to go Edmond!
And being last year was a record setting high, that big increase is the new record.
We were on our way to record setting year at the end of the third quarter, but the last three months were the best for last 6 years and maybe ever. Making even a better record year by up 7% instead of 2%. we had 7 months in 2019 that were the best in last six years. 
Total sales volume for the area was 1.44 billion dollars, with 354.56 million dollars in new construction. So existing homes alone hit the billion dollar sales volume for the first time.
Another first, was the annual average price was over $300,000 for the first time, with an year ending amount of $306,944. Median price for the year was $257,000, the first time over $250,000.

Active inventory is still down overall at 1073. Even though we have more homes than usual in the upper price ranges, we have absorption rates lower in this price ranges compared to previous years. because more are selling. We had 49 homes sell for over a million dollars, just missing that 50 milestone. And we still have quite a few homes under contract in the higher brackets to start off the year.  Come a long way from 1995 when highest sale was around $730,000.

New homes had a good year in 2019 as well, coming back from the record year of 2014. It was still not a record but the first up year since 2014.
New home Sales
2014-1118
2015-1079
2016-945
2017-907
2018-869
2019-1057
It helped having 5 months this year with over a 100 closings for the month, including December. the last such 100 closing month was in 2015.

Congrats to everyone on the record year highs and hopefully we can break it again in 2020.

Click here for The Preston Report for December 2019

Again November saw the highest number of sales for six years for this month. 
We are up 254 transactions above last years record setting year for Edmond. up 6.16%

Active inventory fell to 1088 Listings, 2014 numbers. 
A lot of these were in the upper price ranges. since Oct 1, there have been 260 listings expired with an average price of $419,500 and another 281 released or withdrawn from market with an average price of $428,000.
We will have to see if they come back in the spring to try again.

This is going to be a short message and unless December is off by more than 50% we should be setting yet another record year for 2019.

May you have a Happy New Year and a toast to yet another record for 2020.

Click Here for the November 2019 Preston Report

This was the best October we have had in six years. Just adding to the record breaking year we are heading towards. More info to follow in November's report.

Click Here for October Report

Another good month with 371 closed transactions for Edmond, Deer Creek and Oakdale school systems. making Year to date sales at 3669, up 193 over last year for a 5,55% increase. With 1.12 Billion dollars in sale volume.
The lower price ranges are harder and harder to find homes in. being no homes under $150,000 are being built. I went back and compared Active listings from September 2014 and this September. also the closed YTD sales. It see how much we have changed in five years. There were 1158 listings in September 2014 compared to 1268 in September 2019. We have 110 more homes on the market than 5 years ago. by September 2014 we had 3354 closed transactions compared to 3669 through this May. So we have had 315 more closed Transactions.  But below is a breakdown in price ranges to show where we have made the most changes


                                2014 Active listings     2019 Active Listings         2014 Closed Homes       2019 Closed Homes
Under $150,000                  95                                 7                                    557                              302
$150,001-$225,000            217                               175                                 1070                            1119
$225,001-$300,000            219                               288                                 749                               898
$300,001-$500,000            408                               512                                 730                               994
$500,001-$700,000            113                               143                                 164                               231
$700,001-$999,999             55                                 73                                   68                                92
$1,000,000 and up              51                                 70                                   16                                33

Totals                                1158                            1268                                 3354                           3669

August was another good month, and we are now 149 closed transactions ahead of last years record setting month. which is an increase of 4.7%.
Inventory made a small jump for this time of the year, but that is all new homes which had an increase of 40 listings. They are having to resupply after another 100 plus closing month for new homes.
And 3 more new homes closings were added in the last couple of weeks for July to bring July New home closing to 100 even! Making it four straight months with over 100 closed deals. New homes have not seen those numbers in 5 years.
Still keeping the above $300,000 average price as well, which will be a record setting average price.

We also hit the billion dollar volume closed in August for the time. Last year we hit it in September. In past years it is not until October that we pass that volume number. Except for 2016 when it took until November before we hit it.

Click here for The August 2019 Preston Report

Another Record Breaking Month. In May we hit 500 closing for the first time with 512, July topped that with 527 closings for the Edmond, Deer Creek and Oakdale school Districts.
That brings Year to Date closings thru July to 2820 closed transactions. That is 133 more than last years 2687 deals, and last year was a record setting year. a 4.9% increase in sales for the area.

New homes had another good month with 97 transactions closed. Not a 100 like the last two months, but a lot better than the 60-80 we have been having since 2015. Three good months in a row for new construction.

Active listings holding steady overall. But even with that holding steady, the lower price ranges are becoming scarce and others sitting on the market forever. I pulled up expired and released listings from Jan 1 thru the End of July for the Edmond Area and there were 1452 listings expired or taken off the market. Some may be back on the market and sold the second or third time around, no telling there. Or it could be The builder or agent just trying to make days on market look better by restarting. 
Here is the breakdown by price ranges of expired listings and how many closed in same price range.
Price range                   Expired/Released/Withdrawn             Sold
$150,000 and down -                   28                                     230
$150,001-$200,000 -                  149                                    574
$200,001-300,000 -                    447                                    976
$300,001-500,000 -                    533                                    753
$500,001 and up                         295                                    287

The gap in unsuccessful listings and closed ones grows smaller as you the price goes up and expired out pace sold when you get over $500,000

Click here for The Preston Report