Real Estate is location, location, location...
Home sales fall, but prices still rise
Friday, February 16, 2007
BY BETH FITZGERALD
Star-Ledger Staff
New Jersey's 19.9 percent fourth quarter plunge in existing-home sales was nearly double the nation's 10.1 percent slump.
But housing prices continued to climb in New Jersey, with the Atlantic City area leading the country with a 25.9 percent home-price surge.
Nationally, existing-home sales fell in 40 states and median home prices declined in nearly half of the metropolitan areas surveyed, according to the fourth-quarter report from the National Association of Realtors.
But home prices were up in the four New Jersey metropolitan areas included in the survey. The Atlantic City area's 25.9 percent jump brought the median home price to $339,800. In the Trenton/Ewing area, the gain was 18.9 percent, in Newark/Union County it was 3 percent and in Northern New Jersey/New York it was 2.3 percent.
Price are rising in the Atlantic City and Trenton/Ewing areas because these markets are more affordable and are drawing an influx of buyers, according to Bill Hanley, president of the New Jersey Association of Realtors and manager of Weichert Realtors in Metuchen. Yesterday morning, one of his clients became the successful bidder on a condo in Hamilton that had attracted three offers in only two days on the market, "and the price was $60,000 less than an identical condo in Edison," he said.
Hanley said actual sales fell in New Jersey, even as prices rose, "because sellers who have decided they can't make what they want on their homes are taking them off the market and staying where they are."
"I have a beachfront property that had a price reduction, and 10 people inquired about it -- people are coming out of the woodwork, and investors are coming back to the shore," said Dennis Allen of Astick Realty in Brigantine near Atlantic City.
A lot of the action is in the $500,000 to $700,000 range. Allen said buyers who bid too far under the list price see houses snatched away by more aggressive bidders. "The sellers have stopped panicking, prices have stabilized and I think in the next year or so prices will start rising again," Allen said. ........continued
posted by Realtor Dave at 7:16 AM
