http://www.TwinCitiesUSA.com/video/Real-estate-January-2011-Market-Update

STEVE:  Hi, welcome to my video blog.  I’m Steve Westmark.  It’s January of 2011.  In fact, we’re into February and the stats have come in for January, and here’s a few things we’re going to learn.  The first thing that you can look at is how the listings are coming out.  On this chart is that you’ll see for January they’re slightly lower or the beginning of 2011 compared to last year.  The next chart is looking at pending sales, and I find this to be really interesting. 

It shows over the last three months that in fact where there was a greater amount of difference towards the end of 2010, it’s getting closer and closer as we go into December and January of 2011.  The third chart you’re going to look at is showing active listings.  And what you can see with the pending sales not being maybe as strong and even though the inventory is lighter, you’ll see that our total listings on the market are slightly higher than last year at 10%. 

The next chart is showing the inventory of housing.  Now back in 2009, we had about an 8-month inventory.  Because of the tax credit in 2009 and 10, it was driven down to about a 6-month inventory, but with the tax credit going away, we’re at about a 7-month inventory as we move into 2011.  The last chart is our affordability of housing, and you can see that because of lower interest rates, a lowering of prices, and a better group of inventory that’s out there, affordability for housing has never been better.

It’s a great time to be buying real estate in the Twin Cities.  I hope you enjoyed this quick update on what’s happening in our real estate market and look forward to a positive 2011.