january homebuyers face historically low inventory in denver metro
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By Sara B. Hansen | Published on February 10, 2023
January may have been one of the coldest and snowiest on record, but despite the chill, Denver’s housing market started to thaw out.
Buyers closed on 2,041 homes and condos in January in the 11-county metro area.
That’s a decline from the 2,884 sold in December and the 3,072 sold in January last year, according to January’s Denver Metro Association of Realtors monthly trends report.
But pending sales rose to 3,339, up more than 50% from December and only an 8 percent decline from January 2022. That trend shows stabilizing mortgage rates are bringing buyers back into the market, Libby Levinson-Katz, head of the DMAR Market Trends Committee, wrote in the report.
“While homes are not flying off the market within a weekend, buyers are still in the market. They have wrapped their heads around higher interest rates, have factored in rate buydowns into their purchase costs and are simply taking their time to find the right home,” Levinson-Katz said.
Home sales prices stabilize
January’s median home price for a single-family home was $595,000, down 0.83% from December and 0.68% from a year ago. The median close price for all properties was $535,500, down 3.3% from December and 1.1% from a year ago.
But low inventory may push prices higher again as the weather warms up.
Jared Blank, a managing partner at The Agency Denver, said his agents see multiple offers in every price point from $300,000 $6 million.
Ashleigh Fredrickson, a broker with The Agency Denver, said her clients decided not to put in an offer on a $3.5 million home because the competition was fierce.
“The only reason they didn’t is that when I spoke to the listing agent, they already had seven offers and five of those were for over $4 million,” she said.
Inventory remains low
Sellers listed 2,858 properties last month, 62.2% more than they did in December but 18% fewer than a year ago.
The number of available properties remains historically low. January averages 12,429 active listings according to historical data from 1985 to 2022.
This year, January ended with 4,120 active listings, compared with 4,757 in December and 1,184 in January 2022.
“Over the past three weekends, we saw a return to multiple offers with buyers waiving contingencies and homes selling over ask price similar to last year at this time,” said Kacey Bingham, a managing partner at The Agency Denver.