The Atlanta real estate market continues to struggle with foreclosures and short sales. Unemployment continues to hold our real estate market down and Gwinnett County specifically continues to lead the metro counties in distressed properties hitting the market. Nationally, however, Realty Times has an article out quoting Laurence Yun, chief economist for NAR, as painting a promising picture for the real estate markets overall in 2011.
According to the article, nationally, overall homes sales in October showed an uptick since bottoming in June of this year. What is motivating the buyers? Value and interest rates. Additionally, Laurence Yun, NAR Chief Economist for NAR says, "The housing market clearly is in a recovery phase and will be uneven at times, but the improving job market and consequential boost to household formation will help the recovery process going into 2011." To see this improvement, however, he further states that lending standards will need to be loosened to help home sales. (for more reading: RealtyMarketConditions)
Closer to home, however, sales for October were down 27 percent from one year ago according to SmartNumbers out of Marietta, GA. Economic uncertainty may very well hamper Atlanta's real estate market recovery. When we close the books on 2010, all indicators will point to this being our "4th consecutive down year in housing."
Souces:
SmartNumbers October Market Report
Realty Times.com
FMLS (First Multiple Listing Service
Data in this report has been gathered from FMLS (First Muliple Listing Service). Data is believed to be accurate but is not guaranteed.
