November 2008 Results
No doubt many readers have seen the Huntsville Times article of Dec 4th headlined, ‘Huntsville Home Sales Tumble 40%‘. It was good to see the Huntsville Area Association of Realtors (HAAR) finally produce some credible market numbers for public consumption. While we have been reporting year-over-year sales decreases of 15% to 30% since January of 2008 the HAAR public reporting up to this point never exceeded a decline in the low teens.
To add some additional value to the Madison County numbers published by the Times, we provide the following chart with local sales statistics broken down by the MLS areas that make up just the Huntsville Metro Area.
| Area | Sales Price Sqr/Ft | Price % Diff | Unit Sales |
Sales % Diff | Months Of Inventory |
| Hsv_City_NW | $67 | -2.9% | 28 | -42.9% | 13.57 |
| Hsv_City_NE | $77 | +8.5% | 8 | -46.7% | 18.13 |
| Hsv_City_SW | $81 | -3.6% | 36 | -23.4% | 11.08 |
| Hsv_City_SE | $111 | +2.8% | 23 | -34.3% | 16.00 |
| Hsv_City_East | $110 | -3.5% | 14 | -62.2% | 19.21 |
| Mad_City_Limit | $99 | -2.9% | 32 | -54.9% | 13.19 |
| Mad_Outside_City | $91 | 0% | 28 | -59.4% | 14.75 |
| Metro Area Totals | $90 | -2.1% | 169 | -47.7% | 15.20 |
Looking at the composite Huntsville Home Sales totals we see that the month of November 2008 saw a dramatic drop in demand of -47.7% when compared with sales figures of November 2007. Assuming sales remain at current levels we see a city wide absorption rate inventory of 15.2 months of supply placing Huntsville in the category of a strong buyer’s market.
Given this bias one would also expect to see some price movement which we are and thus we have also included year-over-year price statistics indicating that the moderate price decline we first reported last month is continuing.
It is also of interest to note that certain areas of the city are faring better than others. In the East Huntsville area including Hampton Cove, we are seeing a much larger demand drop off with a -62.2% decline in sales, a year-over-year price reduction of -3.5%, and an inventory level with over 19 months of supply. Buyers will very likely have the upper hand in this area of town over the next few months unless the lower interest rates we are also experiencing spurs increased demand.
Some will no doubt question the 8.5% price increase we are reporting in the Northeast area of the city, and we would like to remind readers that this is a small MLS area that contains the heart of Huntsville’s Historic District and some mountain estate homes. These homes are continuing to appreciate despite market conditions and when we have even a few of these particular home sales during a given month the statistics for the area can be dominated by these sales.
We will follow up this post with our normal monthly market update but felt that with such a dramatic drop off in demand we would also handle the sales figures in a separate post and break them down to specific areas for the benefit of regular readers.
Regards,
Elizabeth
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