Jacksonville Real Estate Trends in August – New Construction Sales Shine!

September 21, 2015

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“It’s impossible,” said pride.
“It’s risky,” said experience.
“It’s pointless,” said reason.
“Give it a try,” whispered the heart.

This thought process is how many great things are accomplished. Because of the solid growth we are seeing in the northeast Florida real estate market and my love for the beach, my heart has whispered and Davidson Realty is growing to a new location on Beach Boulevard next to Taco Lu and Engine 15 in Jacksonville Beach. We are very excited to be able to serve our customers better with the expansion of both Davidson Realty and Davidson Property Management to the beaches area.

The Northeast Florida Association of Realtors market stats for August shows an interesting new trend. Pending sales have averaged between 2,550 and 2,650 homes for the last 6 months which is a huge number of contracts written in a month. To put this in perspective, in 2005 at the peak of the real estate market there were only a couple of months when around 2,500 contracts were written.

The interesting part of this trend is there were approximately 2,700 closings for June and July which made sense with pending sales so high since March, but then we dropped to around 2,300 closings for August. I looked to see what would cause closings to drop when pending sales are so high and found over 1,100 new construction single family homes in the pending sales number. There were 725 new single family homes that went under contract in the last 90 days. There were only 292 new construction single family homes that closed in August. It appears that a large percentage of the pending sales are new construction and will take longer than a resale home to close so we should see strong closings through the end of the year.

The new construction numbers should not be surprising with the continued success of Nocatee and all the new communities being built including Atlantic Beach Country Club, Tamaya, Trailmark, Markland, and so many more.

All of the other statistics are very positive. Median sales price is up 9% year to date over the same period last year. Average sales price is up 6% year to date. The inventory of homes for sale is down 15%. The months supply of inventory is at 4.2 months which is down 28%. The days on the market until sale has dropped from 92 days in March to 75 days in August.

I am very optimistic that the sales and closings will continue to be strong. The price increases are reasonable and should continue. The foreclosures and short sales are becoming less of a factor in our market.

Most of our business is from referrals, so if you know anyone we might assist with their real estate needs or any agents looking for a great company to join, please give me a call at (904) 940-5000.

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Davidson Realty