Southeast Portland Real Estate Snapshot

Southeast Portland has the most houses and usually has the most listings in Portland. Over the last year I have seen a reduction in the number of properties listed for sale across the Metro area, and this has been very dramatic in SE Portland. Over the last few years there have been around 1300 to 1600 houses for sale at any time, but in November 2011 there were on 800 actively listed properties for sale. The good news is that the number of sales over the last year has increased, so a larger percentage of the homes listed are being sold every month. This is called the absorption rate. On the graph above you can see that the blue bars- the number of properties for sale- trended down over the last year. The purple- sales- did a slight upswing through the summer. Normally the number of listings does a dramatic bell curve, peaking in the summer. This year the inventory of properties available to buy did not rise during the year, and I saw this affect my clients greatly. Qualified buyers have been looking for the right house all summer and fall, and they quality properties sell immediately. I think that there is a backlog of buyers, and once people start putting houses on the market in the spring, people will be surprised at how quickly homes that are in good condition and priced right sell.

The numbers are broken down in the chart below: