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Health & Fitness

If Inventory Is Down, Does That Mean Prices Are Up? A Look At The Tampa Bay Market

A peak at the whole Tampa Bay real estate market--is inventory down in other areas like it is here in Westchase?

Watch Melanie on ABC Action news this Saturday morning during the 7:00-8:00 broadcast.  She will be presenting this Tampa Bay real estate information.

The basic law of supply and demand, when applied to real estate, would suggest that the less homes that are for sale, the higher the demand for the available homes.  You can assume that if demand goes up, so do prices. 

Inventory of homes for sale in all 3 of the Bay Area counties are down significantly when compared to last year at the same time.  When you look at the average sales price from June 2011 and compare that with the average sales price in June 2012, you will see that these prices are up over 6% in all 3 Bay Area Counties.  Looking at these numbers, a person may want to shout: “We have recovered!  Bring on the equity!”  

Find out what's happening in Westchasewith free, real-time updates from Patch.

County

Inventory

Find out what's happening in Westchasewith free, real-time updates from Patch.

June 2011

Inventory

June 2012

Inventory

Decrease

Average

Sales Price

June 2011

Average

Sales Price

June 2012

Average Sales

Price Increase

Hillsborough

6938

4784

-31%

$168,000

$183,000

+8.9%

Pinellas

9392

6429

-31.5%

$175,000

$187,000

+6.9%

Pasco

5029

3475

-30.9%

$114,000

$133,000

+16.7%

 

But, an average sales price increase of 10%, for example, does not mean that the value of your house has increased 10%.   It means that more people are buying higher priced homes than they were last year—thus increasing the average.  This is all good news however, because declining inventories and increasing average sales prices are two big steps in the right direction towards a healthy real estate recovery.

Most of the real estate data that people hear about is gathered from large areas:  nationwide, regional, statewide, or by county.  But, when you are buying or selling your house, what is happening in Gainesville isn’t important if you live in Tampa.  Further, most people don’t research the Brandon real estate market before they buy or sell in Westchase.  That is why I wanted to go down to zip code level and provide some interesting Bay Area real estate data.

I dug deep into the newly released June 2012 data on Trendgrapihx.com to find 5 Zip Codes in the Tampa Bay Area that had both large drops in inventory and large increases in average sales prices when comparing June 2011 to June 2012.   

Zip Code

Area

Inventory

June 2011

Inventory

June 2012

Inventory Decrease

Average

Sales Price

June 2011

Average Sales Price June 2012

Average Sales Price Increase

33629

South Tampa

200

142

-29%

$381,000

$456,000

+19.7%

33511

Brandon

236

108

-54.2%

$108,000

$132,000

+22.2%

33544

Wesley Chapel

161

100

-37.9%

$188,000

$218,000

+16%

34677

Oldsmar

186

144

-22.2%

$137,000

$197,000

+43.8%

33701

St. Petersburg

172

66

-61.6%

$194,000

$384,000

+97.9%

Like I said before, the Tampa Bay real estate market is taking steps in the right direction.  Although we are still a very long way from the prices we saw in the peak of our boom in 2006, and many homeowners still have underwater mortgages, the numbers above show that it is time to be optimistic.  It is time to put faith in our recovery.  Every day there are buyers out there writing contracts that are higher than they would have been last year.  Every day a seller is putting her home on the market only to be surprised that she received 3 good offers in a week.  Every day real estate agents are wondering when the last time was that they were so busy.

You can feel the positive energy on the ground level.  Hopefully this translates to a future for the Tampa Bay real estate market that is as bright as our Florida sunshine. 

Melanie Atkinson is a Realtor with The Wood Team at Coldwell Banker.  She can be reached at 813-368-6084 or Melanie@woodteamrealty.com

"Like" The Wood Team on Facebook or follow Melanie on Twitter @CBMelanieA

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