We will drive ourselves crazy if we try to keep our binoculars on the constantly wavering Denver Colorado real estate market. But at this point, every little improvement that reassures us of the stable investment in our Denver CO homes is reassuring. Let’s take a look at the Denver CO real estate market without dissecting it or getting too caught up in the details.
The Denver Business Journal on September 9, 2008 looked at the Metrolist Inc. data and remarked, “The average selling price of single-family homes and condominiums in metro Denver rose in August from the previous month, but fell from a year ago.” More specifically, single-family homes sold for an average of $284,531 this August and during August 2007 they averaged something like $316,000.
Generally speaking, it is best to look at median home prices instead of the average. The median price is the price of a home in the middle of the scale of sold properties. Half sold for more and half sold for less than that figure. Just one $20-million estate or several $5-million Colorado horse properties will readily skew those averages.
Good thing that our homes in Denver are long-term investments. Looking back over several years, however, median Denver home prices are holding their own. During the decade of the 1990s, the median home price in Denver grew from $100,000 to the $200,000s. Not a bad investment. By August 2005 the median price was $220,000, by August 2006 $228,000, by August 2007 $239,000. Several articles posted online report declines in prices during the same period of time, a natural sine wave fluctuation. When we keep our horses in step for the long-term, we just ride through the storm without panic.
The condominium market did a little better over the last year as more people decided to purchase properties at lower price points. That’s not to say that there aren’t some very pricey condos around here but rather that builders have needed to lower prices to move inventory. Metrolist reported that the supply of homes has finally dropped in the last year from 30,827 to under 25,000—another bit of good news for sellers.
For more information about horse properties and real estate in the metro area, call Michael Paul of Realty Oasis at (303) 268-6052.
