In the last two months, the market has remained steady.  We have had actives rise slowly from 26,000 to 28,000 homes in Phoenix metro.  Similarly, pendings are hovering around 10,600 to 10,800.  We also had 7137 homes sold in October compared to 7040 homes sold in August and 6861 in September.  Overall, in Phoenix, we have gone from 5.24 months of inventory to 5.42 months of inventory.

October 2009 Real Estate Supply

There were two very strong source of buyers.  First time home buyers trying to get the tax credit were still very active.  Investors trying to take advantage of the market have also bought up many homes.  We see that in October 32.66% of the homes were bought in cash.  The rumors is that on top of the Canadian money coming in, there’s a lot of Chinese and Japanese money pumping into our market.  No doubt with the winter season upon us, there will be even more Canadian buyers.

October 2009 Numbers

Most of the cities have remained pretty consistent during this time period.  Only Tempe and Scottsdale have seen noticeable changes.  Tempe has gone from 6.1 to 7.2 months of inventory while Scottsdale has gone from 10.3 months to 9.4.  We have noticed that there was a small drop in activity in the first week of November with the tax credit expected to expire at the end of the month.  Now that the credit has been extended again, activity has also picked up again.  Other great news for the real estate market is that the tax credit now is offered to homeowners that have been in their homes for more than 5 years.  It will be interesting to see who qualifies for this program.

Real Estate Market Analysis for October 2009