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April 1st, 2010
Five Years in Camano Real Estate
5 Years! April 2005 to April 2010. Looking back, if someone had told me what running a real estate brokerage would have been like over the past 5 years I would have turned around and run. Having said that – looking back now, I’m glad we bought this business. I’ve changed so much in this past ½ decade, grown as a business person and learned a lot about perseverance.
At family dinners, one of our favorite traditions is to go around the table and share our high and low of the day. We can only share one high and one low and it has to be from “today and today only”. I was reflecting the other day on what my high and low would be in this business over the past 5 years. My low would definitely be the recession (big surprise). I used to think we were in a protective bubble on Camano Island and wouldn’t be hit by any of the struggles in the economy faced by the rest of the world. I was wrong. My high would be watching the company and agents transform into this productive, high energy, community driven entity.
You know I love stats – I took a look at the end of the first quarter in 2010 vs. end of the first quarter in 2005. I was happy to see that the average sale prices weren’t that far off from 5 years ago. There are many more homes listed today but they sold faster then.
It has been a good 5 years. Our company is stronger now, we are more involved in the community and we are anticipating a bright future.
March 2nd, 2010
What’s Happening in the Camano Island Housing Market?
Most of our agents know that I consider myself the Queen of Camano Island Market Stats. One of the downfalls of this self appointed title is that I truly believe everyone enjoys talking about stats, looking at stats and staring at charts and graphs as much as I do. If you like numbers, read on…
The chart on the right shows the activity in each price range. As expected the majority of the activity is in the $250,000 and under range, but how refreshing to see small bursts of activity in the 300s and 400s.
Pending sales have been on the rise all year long. In my opinion, there are two reasons for this:
1. Sales are taking longer to close for a variety of reasons, stricter lending guidelines, bank involvement in short sales just to name a few. Some of these 41 pending sales have been waiting to close for several months.
2. Consumer confidence is slowly returning. Buyers have been waiting for the right time – interest rates are still low, tax credits are still available, homes are priced right and it is a Buyer’s market.
January 11th, 2010
2009 Camano Market Ends on a High Note
We are happy to see that 2009 has ended in a much better state than it began! December Pending Sales on Camano Island are up 133% over last December. There were 9 homes that pended in December of 2008 and 21 that pended in December of 2009. Signs point to the trend continuing into the first quarter of 2010.
On Camano Island, 186 residential homes were sold in 2009. 190 were sold in 2008. These numbers were not so close in the first and second quarters. The end of the third and beginning of the fourth quarter numbers caught us up with 2008.
The Windermere Market Share has also shown a healthy increase over the course of 2009. When the stats were published on January 7, our listing market Share for Camano Island was 50%. Our closest competitor is 10%. Selling market share is also hovering around 50%.
To download the 1 page PDF Report - Click here:
2009 Camano Island Year End Real Estate Market Statistics