My colleague Leif Swanson came out with his annual Good News Bad News analysis for the 2010 real estate market.

The take-away:

Good — The media only reports on the low prices. They don’t tell you that sales are at an all-time high. That means other people are scooping up the great deals! See below.

Bad — Homes priced above $350,000 remained hard to sell.

Call me today if you want to grab the deals before they are gone.

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The Good News:

• Property prices overall for Maricopa County went UP just a tiny bit higher than 2009 (by less than $600).  Some cities had increases in average sold prices in 2010 while others still suffered.  See the attached “MLS Sales Per City 2009-2010” sheet to see how your city performed.
• 2010 was the 4th best sales year ever.  Almost 90,500 were sold in 2010.
• December 2010 had the most sales of any December in history:  8,435.
• April 29, 2010 had the all-time highest number of properties under contract:  23,630!
• Interest rates dropped below 5% for most of 2010.  I had a client get 4.33%!
• Low property prices combined with low interest rates make this an incredible time to buy.
• Investors gobbled up bank-owned foreclosure properties.  Over 40% of all sales in 2010 were cash sales.  Two years ago people were asking about the second wave of foreclosures (aka shadow inventory); it never happened.  Nearly 53,000 active listings in January 2009, but less than 40,000 active listings at 2010’s peak in November 2010.  We’re down to 37,350 active listings in January ’11.  This is the lowest level of inventory since 2005.  Over 4,000 bank-owned properties were sold in December 2010; thank goodness for investors.
• Hardly any new homes were built in 2010, which helps keep inventory down.

The Bad News:

• April 2009 was the bottom of the current bad real estate market or so we thought.  After the first-time homebuyer tax credit program expired this summer, sales dropped off significantly for “regular” buyers (investors carried the load for the rest of the year).  Because cash investors replaced regular buyers, the average and median sales prices dropped.  We hit bottom in November 2010 with average sales price and price per square foot.  We hit bottom with median sales price in December 2010.
• Foreclosures dominated the real estate market, accounting for 41% of 2010, but down from 55% of 2009’s sales.  Short sales accounted for 21% of all sales in 2010.  Combined, bank-owned and short sales were 62% of all sales.
• Homes priced above $350,000 remained hard to sell.
• Vacant properties accounted for 76% of all sales in 2010.
• Loan modification programs failed to help struggling homeowners.
• Job loss and job fears are keeping people from buying despite low prices & interest rates.
• People can’t sell their homes in other states in order to move here.
• Short sales did better in 2010 as banks increased staffing.  However, there are still fears of banks coming after “forgiven” loans.  If you are considering doing a short sale or foreclosure, please check out the Short Sale Advisory at www.AARonline.com (the AZ Assoc. of Realtor’s website).