Meriden Market Update February 2009

The Meriden housing market seems to stuck in a funk over the past 3 months. For single family homes, total inventory has gone down by 21% while sales have remained relatively flat. We’re hearing that much of the inventory that has come off the market are either overpriced or need work to make them appealing to would-be buyers. It also appears that the homes that are selling are selling for less but also somewhat quicker than last month. At current inventory levels, it would take almost a year to sell all the available houses. As with the Wallingford market, we think the approaching Spring market will help business substantially.

Condo sales again are mired at zero. Only one condo has sold in Meriden in the past 90 days, which is mystifying. The Meriden condo market has always been robust due to good prices and lower tax rates since the last assessment, but now it seems to be almost impossible to sell one. That’s a bad sign, since there are about 200 homes in Meriden right now (according to RealtyTrac.com) that are in either pre-foreclosure or already bank-owned. Of course, they’re not all condos, but a nice house available at condo prices is pretty stiff competition. Again, with the passage of the $8000 tax credit and loan rates still in the low 5′s, we’re confident that Meriden will be back to it’s old self fairly soon.

Here’s the comparison of the last three months:

*** = No stats due to no sales.

For the purposes of housing market info, it is usually considered to be a seller’s market when there is less than 13 weeks of inventory on the market; 13-26 weeks of inventory is considered a balanced market, and more than 26 weeks indicates a buyer’s market.

Data used was provided by the CTMLS (Connecticut Multiple Listing Service).

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Tagged as: 06450, 06451, Business, Condominium, Days on market, Inventory, market update, Meriden Connecticut, real estate, Real estate economics