Home sales figures and the median sale price hit their highest point of the year, according to the Lake Havasu Market Report for July 2020. Unfortunately, our inventory continues its deep dive. Until we see more listings hit the market, prices will continue to rise. That’s great news for sellers but not so great for buyers. What is good news for buyers, however, is that interest rates remain at historically low levels.
Lake Havasu Market Report – July 2020
July 2020 Home Sales
Flex MLS reported that a total of 284 properties in Lake Havasu City were sold in July 2020. That marks a 26.2% increase from the 225 sold last July. It’s also the highest reported monthly sales for the entire year so far. This helped nudge our total Lake Havasu real estate sales to 2.3% higher than the same point last year, even with COVID-19 putting a damper on sales earlier this year. The June 2020 sales figures put us at 2.7% lower than in June of last year. Pending listings rose by 54.5% from July 2019 to 292 for last month. Active listings fell from 739 in July 2019 to 439 in July 2020. New listings entering the market rose 61.6% in the last 12 months, from 203 to 328.
July 2020 Sale Prices
Lake Havasu sale prices hit their highest point ever last month. In July 2019, buyers paid a median sale price of $280,000. In July 2020, that rose by 24.11% to $347,500. Since January of this year, the median sale price increased 15.8%. With buyer demand high and inventory low, it’s very likely we’ll be seeing prices continue to rise for the next several months.
July 2020 Inventory
The drop in active listings hurts our inventory levels. In July of last year, we showed 3.85 months of inventory available. This July, that fell 42.08% to just 2.23 months available. This continues the month-over-month decrease in inventory that our Lake Havasu real estate market has experienced since April. The median days a home spent on the market plummeted from 51 in July 2019 to just 19 in July 2020. The only month we saw it lower than that this year was in April, with a median of 18 days on market.
What Buyers Need to Know
After dipping below the 3% level interest rate for a 30-year fixed-rate loan in mid-July (2.98%), the rose slightly back up to 3%, the same as it was in June 2020, according to Wells Fargo. At 2.5%, you might be enticed to purchase a property with a 15-year fixed-rate loan instead. If your credit is up to snuff, you might even want to change from your current 30-year loan to a 15-year loan. Yes, the payment does run higher. But you pay it off in a much shorter time frame and save yourself thousands of dollars in interest. Even if your credit falls short of excellent, lenders offer several different programs to help you qualify for a home of your own.
Unfortunately, it looks like prices still have not quite hit their peak yet. As the year goes along, we could see them inch even higher. So, you need to be ready to pounce when you find something that catches your eye. Call me at (928) 208-5184 or shoot me an email so that we can get started on your search for a new Lake Havasu home today.
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