Los Altos October Home Sales Are Up from September

After a post-summer slowdown, sales in the local housing market rebounded in October, according to the latest home sales report.

But sales did drop on a year-to-year basis in both Los Altos and Los Altos Hills.

In Los Altos, 29 single-family homes were sold last month. It is 7 percent more than last month but 15 percent less than the same time last year. The median home price, $1,740,000, is 16 percent higher than September and represents a very moderate increase (0.1%) from last October.

In Los Altos Hills, sales remained unchanged from the previous month; though it is down by 38 percent as compared to the same time last year. Its median home price, $1,950,000, represents a 5 percent and 9 percent drop from last month and last year respectively. It is also the lowest since March 2010.

The rebound in sales in October was probably partly seasonal, and partly attributed to a rise in the inventory in the previous month, when more new listings came on the market.

It should be noted that a rise or drop in the median home price doesn’t necessary mean the price of the same home has changed in that direction. Rather, it means that more lower-priced or higher-priced homes were sold during the month, resulting in a lower or higher median.

It is also worth to noting that both “the average days on market” and “percentage of list price received” improved in October. The average days on market refers to the average number of days it took to sell a home. And the percentage of listed price received tells us on average how much a buyer paid in relations to the asking price. Both are important indicators of the state of the housing market.

In Los Altos, the average days on market is 30 in October, compared to 45 and 59 in the previous month and last October. On average, buyers paid 99.63 of the listed price to buy a home—the highest since July.

In Los Altos Hills, it took an average of 66 days to sell a house, a major improvement from 120 days on market in September, and 102 in last October. More importantly, at 98.48, its average percentage of list price received is the highest in recent years. The rise most likely was due to the sales of more entry-level homes, as suggested by the drop in median home price.

Thanksgiving is less than two weeks away; While the housing market usually slows down during the holidays, the latest home sales report suggests that homes in Los Altos and Los Altos Hills, especially those that are priced properly, continue to sell. Inventory will remain low in the next few months. But it seems that demand for housing continues to be healthy. Be sure to check us back next month to see how the local market fares in this holiday seasons!

October 2011 Home Sales Statistics

Single Family Residences

City

Sales

Change from last year

Average Day on Market

Median price

Change from last year

% listed price received

Los Altos

29

-15%

30

1,740,000

0.1%

99.63

LAH

5

-38%

66

1,950,000

-9%

98.48

Source: MLS Listings

Information deemed reliable but not guaranteed.

Winnie Yip Fong, a Los Altos resident and a local realtor, prepares this monthly home sales report to keep readers updated of the local housing market. Email her to winniefong.realestate@gmail.com for any suggestions or comments. You can also follow her on www.twitter.com/SVHomes for more local real estate updates.