Over the years as our clients
became more tech-smart and sophisticated, our data collection has also
evolved.
Monthly Sales Reports
Today, we conduct a monthly
survey of San Francisco and Marin counties residential real estate markets looking at sales and current listings. In San Francisco our survey covers
approximately 61% of all residential sales (single family homes, condos, co-ops
and TICs plus 100% of 2-4 unit residential buildings). In
Marin we survey approximately 75% of all residential sales (single family homes and condos.
One of the features that sets
our surveys apart from most published statistics is that we focus on the
most common/popular configurations of homes (for example: 2 bedroom, 1 bath
single family homes; 1 bedroom, 1 bath condos).
This gives a truer picture of changes in the market than averages that
include all residential properties, especially since we have some very
expensive homes in both counties that would otherwise skew results. It’s especially helpful for buyers and
sellers since it allows them to focus in just on the segment of the market
their specific configuration represents.
In San Francisco we also break
down sales by the ten real estate districts established by our local
association of realtors and MLS.
Sales by Price Range
Over the years we have added
reports that include all residential sales in specific price ranges. When we first started it was rather easy to
develop the ranges since it was obvious that selling prices under $500k were
quickly disappearing. The next ranges,
$500k-$799k and $800k-$999k, were chosen because many buyers were only able to
qualify for mortgages in those ranges.
(For a while, $799k represented the upper limit for buyers who could
only qualify for a “conforming” loan). The
final ranges were determined largely by what seem to be naturally occurring
sales price clusters or groups.
New Listing Market Watch
All of the reports described
above are done on a monthly or quarterly basis which means we’re looking back
at purchase decisions that were made as much as 4-8 weeks prior to the date of
the report. We were missing a “predictive”
component that would bring us closer to the current mindset of buyers and
sellers. We began to report on the “hot
sheet” feature of our MLS. This allows
us to track the number of new listings in the previous two weeks as well as
price reductions and the number of those new listings that go into contract
within that same period. This gives us
an idea of the volatility of the market since competition is almost always a
factor in the San Francisco real estate market.
Along with average asking prices for active listings which we track in
our monthly sales reports and personal knowledge gleaned from open houses,
brokers’ tours and other agents experiences, this information gets us as close
to current as possible.
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