October 2020 Sales Recap
The Maine Real Estate market in October continued to be strong with no signs of backing off. Traditionally, winter is a slower market, but what sellers need to understand especially this winter market, buyers are out there all year. Let us look at sales for single family homes from Oct. 31st, 2019 vs Oct. 31st, 2020. Sales of 1845 increased to 2341, a growth of 26.88%. The median price for all of Maine also increased 24.50% for the same period from $224,900 to $280,000. The definition of median price means half the houses sold for above and half sold for under. In Cumberland County October 2020 median price was $386,250, that is an increase of $61,250 from October 2019. Again, what is driving this is low inventories, low interest rates, families looking for larger homes, and this month the out of State buyers increased to 36%.
Like Maine, the national market continues to be strong even with high unemployment and surging COVID-19. Here are some other statistics according to Lawrence Yun, the chief economist for the National Association of Realtors. Numbers for year over year show single family homes for October up 27%. Some interesting numbers from September show the sales analysis of the numbers: 21.8 single family, condominiums up 13.6, and vacation homes are up 34%. Nationally the day’s supply of inventory for September 2020 was at 2.7 vs 4.0 for September 2019.
Back in Maine, for some, this is a difficult market. First-time home buyers are getting squeezed with increased homes prices, and money down requirements. Some homeowners may be sitting on the sidelines because of being in forbearance or in some type of foreclosure moratorium.
Linda and I are here to talk, and to help buyers and sellers navigate this extremely challenging market.
Source: Maine Real Estate Information System, Inc. (d/b/a Maine Listings). Note: Maine Listings, a subsidiary of the Maine Association of REALTORS®, is a statewide Multiple Listing Service with over 5,400 licensees inputting active and sold property listing data. Statistics reflect properties reported as sold in the system within the time periods indicated.