Phoenix Foreclosures: now the 8th worst area to buy Foreclosures

Phoenix foreclosures no longer have the same presence that created bad memories about the Phoenix housing market. In fact, and according to Realty Trac, Phoenix is now the 8th worst city in which to buy foreclosures.

This article follows one I wrote yesterday about how Phoenix foreclosures are no longer the driving force in the Phoenix housing market. Additionally, and according to Realty Trac, foreclosure activity is down in 12 of the 20 largest metropolitan areas and up in eight of the 20 largest metros.

From Realty Trac:
To select the best and worst places to buy foreclosures in 2013, RealtyTrac scored all metro areas with a population of 500,000 or more by summing up four numbers: months’ supply of foreclosure inventory, percentage of foreclosure sales, foreclosure discount, and percentage increase in foreclosure

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Phoenix Foreclosures no longer driving force in real estate market

Phoenix Foreclosures have been steadily decreasing, as reported in our Housing Tracker since October 2010, and the news seems to ringing loud and clear in the media. Reports of doom and gloom are a faint memory in people's minds as real estate investors have had to reduce their ROI (return on investment) expectations or find other foreclosure ridden towns.

Home owners are the happiest as they see their equity steadily rise and many are even considering selling as values are higher than they have been in almost 4.5 years. See our price per square foot chart at this page: Price per Square Foot in Phoenix Area MLS. Price per SF has risen to $108 in January 2013, up from $85 last January and $81 in January 2011.

Curious about the current foreclosure inventory? Click on the below link:
SEARCH PHOENIX FORECLOSURES
From the AZ Republic:

For the past five years, Phoenix foreclosures have been one of the most important indicators to track metro Phoenix’s housing market. Not anymore.
Both Phoenix foreclosures and Phoenix

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The Most Expensive Homes for Sale in Tempe AZ

Tempe is a very desirable city in which to live because of Arizona State University, Mill Avenue, the Tempe Public School System, a variety of entertainment venues, Tempe Town Lake and so much more. As Tempe Realtors we've created a permanent page on our blog that will show you the most expensive homes for sale in Tempe AZ, as classified by the sales price of over $620,000.
Homes for Sale in Tempe AZ
You can now find this permanent page by bookmarking this link: Homes for sale in Tempe AZ over $620,000. The homes on this page are not filtered by any criteria other than the sales price. Because of that you will find single family homes and Tempe Town Lake Condos. Tempe Town Lake Condos are among the highest priced properties for all Tempe real estate. You will also find homes on golf courses, homes in gated communities, and waterfront properties.

However, and because we are Tempe Realtors, we have also created the following pages that caters to specific

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Phoenix / Scottsdale Luxury Homes Market Slowly Recovering

Phoenix / Scottsdale Luxury Homes are off of most people's radar because a smaller percentage of people are willing (or able) to spend $1,000,000 or more for a home. By the way, depending who you talk to Scottsdale Luxury Homes could be classified as properties over $750,000 or over $1,000,000. Yet we are all fascinated with the designs, features, and locations of these Phoenix Area and Scottsdale Luxury Homes.

Click the link if you're interested in seeing Scottsdale Luxury Homes over $4,000,000.

I like to attend the annual seminar on Scottsdale Luxury Homes offered by the AZ School of Business and Real Estate because there is always good information to learn about luxury trends. Their learned and respected speakers, among whom are Michael Orr, have affirmed that the pricing trens for Scottsdale Luxury Homes follows the normal resale market by approximately 18-months.

Since our normal market hit bottom in the spring of 2011 (see stats here: Housing Tracker and look at the "Total $$ per Sq Ft" column) the Scottsdale Luxury Homes market would have hit bottom in the fall of 2012. However, this article says the bottom was in February of 2012.



 

Here are

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Homes for Sale in Tempe AZ: Authority source for all Tempe Real Estate

Our Real Estate office is located in Tempe and that's also where I live. Homes for sale in Tempe AZ are one of my specialties and I've have created a brand new section of our blog titled "Homes for Sale in Tempe AZ." Because of the scope of information provided it is one of the most comprehensive places on the web to search for Tempe Homes.

Customers will also be able to access school information from GreatSchools.net and one of the most sophisticated crime statistics tools I've ever seen from RaidsOnLine.com. We've included these extras to make your home hunting experience as easy and pleasurable as possible. We offer these tools as a way to help all home buyers searching for homes for sale in Tempe AZ.

Be sure to try our map search feature with a direct feed from the Arizona Regional MLS (not one of those look-a-likes) embedded in the page that gives a great visual perspective of all properties. It takes you directly to Tempe and all homes for sale in Tempe AZ. Take it for a spin.

Homes for sale in Tempe AZ has options that are designed for our customers . You'll have a choice of searching homes for sale in Tempe AZ by a total of six price ranges, 4 specialty groups, and 5 of the most popular subdivisions in Tempe. The specialty

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Selling Your Home? Home Buyers 1st Impressions Count

Are you living in the Phoenix area and want to sell your home quickly to avoid tons of strangers walking through it? There have been plenty of articles written on how to sell your house. However, they usually come from the perspective of a realtor telling the buyer what to do to make their house more presentable. This article will focus on a very important topic that many realtors want to avoid: professional quality photography.

Why do many realtors avoid the topic of photography? Quite simply, their knowledge of photography is limited and they don't want to pay a professional between $100 - $500 for a set of pictures. They hope to sell your home after taking 15 minutes to shoot some photos and uploading

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Phoenix Real Estate Listings - April 2010

The number of active listings in the Phoenix real estate market remained relatively constant for yet another month. The drop in the number of listings was only 587 listings from March 1st to April 1st. The big news expects to be the total number of homes sold for March 2010. It looks as though home sales may approach the 9,000 mark, making March the biggest residential sales month since last July.

Read the chart this way:
"Residential listings in The Phoenix area totaled 34,461 to begin April 2010, a drop of 587 from March. 14,087 of those listings are foreclosure listings (bank owned or REO properties and short sales). Foreclosures make up 40.9% of the total listings.

Talk of "shadow inventory" still looms on blogs and in the news.

The second chart shows the breakdown between the normal listings and the foreclosure listings. Read the chart this way:
"20,374 listings are "normal listings that have been on the market for an average of 172 days. 14,087 listings are foreclosure listings that have been on the market an average of 102 days."

Short sales have dragged that number higher as bank owned homes slip off the market much sooner than short sales in Metro Phoenix. Real estate with short sales continues to be an adventure.

Short Sale Roulette

Phoenix Real Estate February 2010

Phoenix Real Estate sales were up 14% in February 2010.

February only had 28 days, but that was enough time to beat January's total home sales in Metro Phoenix. Real estate residential sales increased from 5,812 in January to 6,613 home sales in February 2010. Need we ask why? The answer continues to be last minute shopping for the tax credit fueled by low interest rates. Expect more of the same during the next few months.

Read the chart in this manner: 6,613 homes sold in February in Metro Phoenix . Real estate defined as "normal" sales (not bank owned property or short sales) accounted for 2,463 sales, or 37.2% of the total. 4,150 sales were foreclosure related which comprised 62.8% of the total.

Here's another interesting statistic. Year over year sales, commonly known as YOY (a common industry comparison standard), have been up for 21 consecutive months (not completely shown by the chart ). YOY essentially compares the sales in February 2010 to the sales in February 2009, the sales in January 2010 to the sales in January 2009, and so on. In other words, Phoenix real estate sales have consistently been improved from the previous year.

It's also interesting to note that foreclosures (bank owned or REO property and shorts sales) officially accounted for over 1/2 all sales in the Phoenix real estate market beginning in October 2008. They have surged as high as 75.9% but have yet to drop below the 50% mark. My chart goes back to June 2007 for anyone who wants a longer term perspective.

My next post will evaluate the number of foreclosure sales and their makeup in terms of how many were lender owned properties and how many were short sales.

Phoenix Real Estate Forum

Tempe, Scottsdale, Mesa, Glendale, Chandler, Gilbert, homes

Listings remain stable in Phoenix Real Estate Market - March 2010

Phoenix Real Estate Market remains dominated by Phoenix foreclosures.

The number of active listings in and around metropolitan Phoenix remained virtually unchanged from February to March of 2010. As depicted in the chart, property listings hit a several year low in September 2009.  They have been slowly on the rise since that time.  The chart also indicates the dramatic difference since 2008 when listings were over 50,000, thereby accounting for the swing in the market from a complete buyer's market to a market that has occasionally been referred to as a seller's market in Phoenix.  Real estate listings in some locations around the Valley have sparked a seller's market because of extreme competition for low priced Metro Phoenix foreclosures. It's no real surprise because real estate prices in the Phoenix housing market are at their lowest levels in 10-years AND interest rates are still low.

The chart also shows that 41.2% of all listings in the Phoenix area are foreclosures. I am defining foreclosures as bank owned homes and short sales.

Phoenix Luxury Homes

Phoenix MLS Syndication

Google Fiber

Something Stinks in Phoenix Real Estate

There currently 9,200 homes for sale in the city of  Phoenix. Real estate deals are around every corner in the Metro area. Many REO properties need some work and we expect that. Some Phoenix real estate deals  need lots of work and cause potential buyers to go hmmmm .... And then there's the occasional house that really stinks! Literally.

I took a buyer, who flew in from New Zealand, out to look at REO properties on Wednesday and saw some really good deals for Phoenix homes for sale. The banks don't like to waste time anymore and most are starting to price properties really aggressively ... enough so that many REO homes are still getting up to 15-20 visits in the first week. I took a buyer, who flew in from New Zealand, out to look at REO properties on Wednesday and saw some really good deals for Phoenix real estate. The banks are getting wise to the game, and most are starting to price really aggressively ... enough so that many REO homes are getting up to 20 visits in the first 1-2 weeks.

Well, we are 5 homes into our search when we open the door to a really nice looking home in Phoenix. Real estate memories fill my mind, but this was one of those moments that would have been interesting to record -- then watch our reaction on video. I knew something was wrong as soon as I swung open the door. 5 steps into the house and my eyes were beginning to sting. Holy pet urine Batman! This was not the work of a random "tinkler." These pets had the run of the place. I never thought I would need to stop by Big 5 Sports and buy 2 gas masks before showing any Phoenix homes for sale.

My client was shocked at the smell. It was almost so thick it could be cut with a knife. But after traveling half way around the world to look at Phoenix real estate she could not be stopped. She proceeded to do a quick walk-through of the downstairs and headed upstairs. I started to assess her weight and wondered if I would need to carry her out of the house. It has been awhile since I worked out regularly at the gym. My mind started remembering the correct lifting techniques to avoid back injury.

She disappeared up the stairs and I tried to regain my senses. It occurred to me that she might think this yank was a pansy, so I darted up the stairs. That was a mistake because I started to breath harder. My memory was jolted into remembering that warm air rises. If it was possible, the smell was even worse upstairs. Of all the Phoenix real estate I could have been in ... then I lost my train of thought.

Where am I?

Then I remembered. My client came out of the master bedroom and headed for the stairs (thank you God). She didn't appear faint (thank you God). We headed outside and locked up the house. My client actually liked the floor plan and features and commented that removing the carpet would help a lot. She wondered what my thoughts were on the subject.

I actually had thoughts on the subject because, first of all, my sight and mind was returning. I told her I had bought a house with a similar problem at the trustee's sale, which of course was "sight unseen" (and smell un-smelled). I described the process of scrubbing and sealing concrete. I described the process of sanding and sealing 2x4's that were along the concrete floor. Thankfully she was losing interest in the house and I wouldn't need to return (thank you God)! On to better smelling Phoenix real estate!

Today I received an email from the listing agent wondering what I thought about the house. It was then I decided to write this post. My return email will contain a link to it. That should be satisfactory feedback, don't you think?