Zillow has an outstanding blog post up discussing data on home values from Q2 of 2008. (This is the type of blogging that every company should be doing – writing that has actionable value and provides incentives for responses and conversations.)
The bottom line? Home values are falling – and they keep falling. Zillow is reporting a year-to-year price decline of 9.9 percent. This is not good. The Zillow post really goes deep and discusses why this price drop is occurring, and what we can expect in the future. Read it.
The Zillow post also links to Zillow’s Real Estate Market Reports, which I’d like to discuss, specifically for Greenville, S.C. Is Greenville’s real estate marketing providing any different data? Let’s first look at year-to-year changes in home value for Greenville.
Greenville home values – for the most part – are up for the last year. Often times, values have increased more than three percent. Here’s a different look at home-value appreciations:
Again, we see that in the Greenville MSA, on average, all homes increased in value 3 percent over the last year. This is a 12 percent return compared to the national average!
While the average-value change of homes in the Upstate paints a rosy picture, let’s dig a little deeper and look at the percentage of homes that were sold for a loss during the last year.
Yes, as expected, some homes were sold for a loss from 2007 – 2008, and that number did increase to around 18 percent of all homes sold for a loss. There is is a slightly increasing risk when investing in homes in Greenville that a loss may be realized. However, when compared to the national average, this number of course is much more favorable in Greenville.
There is even more data available on the Zillow Real Estate Reports page for Greenville. I encourage everyone to take a few minutes to play with the data.
While it’s humbling to see the national real-estate market fairing so poorly, it is also comforting to know that the Greenville area is still growing, and real-estate investors are seeing positive returns.
Want more info and analysis about the Greenville and Lake Keowee real estate markets? Shoot us an email at admin at carolinalivingrealty.com – or just leave a comment!
It’s great to see prices are staying steady and appreciating in your market! While there is risk with any home purchase, it is always reassuring to see your local market doing slightly better than the national averages.