Welcome 2009. Good riddance 2008.

The real estate market in the Portland area trailed off quietly into the new year, burdened by poor economic news and low pending sales from the past couple months, then ending with a 40-year-high snowfall that shut the city down in the week prior to Christmas. Not a strong ending.

Hope springs anew for 2009, but the Portland housing market will be looking further into the year for good news. December ended with a 36% decline year-over-year decline in home sales. While November sold a little over 1,000 homes, December could only muster results in the mid-900′s. The average units sold for this time of year has been easily twice that over the past six years.

The median price is down 8% and the average down 15% from the marks set 1 year ago. You should expect to see final accounts showing the median price around $254,000. At the peak of the market, the median topped $302,000.

January isn’t shaping up to be much better, due to slow December performance. Only a little over 600 homes went sale pending for the month. Two to three times that number is the December tradition. Complete results will be out around the 15th and some of these numbers could shift some.

Nevertheless, I’m looking forward to 2009 and will be making some changes and announcements at re:PDX this year. One will be more use of video, hopefully more scintillating than my 2009 foray below.

Please enable Javascript and Flash to view this Viddler video.

Stay tuned.

January 8, 2009 · Filed Under Market Activity

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