December 14-15, 2024

Weekend Open Homes & Market Analysis

The weekly update from The Home Factor Team of Realtors for the weekend of Saturday, December 14, 2024, and Sunday, December 15, 2024.

*The specific cities and districts covered in this market analysis report are Berkeley, Oakland, Piedmont, Albany, Kensington, El Cerrito, Richmond, El Sobrante, Pinole, Hercules, and Crockett. 

We’re  happy to provide a complete list of *all Inner-East Bay open homes for this weekend, please click here.

For Open Homes limited mostly to the Berkeley area, we're happy to share the ‘Ad Review’. The Ad Review is a private Berkeley publication of open homes. It has a pleasant format but is by no means an exhaustive list of open homes in the Inner-East Bay. 

For this week’s Saturday Open Homes ‘Ad Review’ please click here.

For this week’s Sunday Open Homes ‘Ad Review’ please click here. 

The number of open houses for Sundays this year peaked on 9/20 with 528 open houses, which is the typical post-Labor Day trend, but has slowed down in recent weeks per the chart below. This slow down represents the normal seasonal trend each year for the period from mid-October until mid-January. The data for 12/1/24 (Thanksgiving) shows a pronounced dip which is typical for a major holiday, and we’re declining again as we approach the end of December.

The distribution of listings in Oakland with an open house on Sunday relative to the Inner East Bay as a whole is at 61% which is 5 points lower than the past 4 month average of 66% and seems to point to the possibility that the number of listings in Oakland is declining at a slightly faster pace than other Inner East Bay cities. 

Fall Inventory is generally tightening in the East Bay with  a declining number of listings available.  There are 49% fewer single family homes actively available on the market in Oakland this weekend compared to 2 months ago, for example. The only exception to this is in El Cerrito which has had a slight uptick in active listings over the past month. We have an unusual set of dynamics at play in the market: Mortgage rates ticked up after the Fed announced its first rate cut in September. This caused confusion in the market, sidelining some buyers. And, of course, we had a divisive election which will take a period of time for the money markets to digest and could cause ongoing volatility in money markets during the transition of power.

Pro Tip: Reach out to us to learn about, and to discuss homes that are sitting on the market longer than is healthy for their bottom line and where a deal might exist for you. This is a good time of year for deals on property that has not successfully found a buyer within 3 weeks of being on the market. 

Let’s look at the market activity for only single family detached homes in our biggest 3 cities in the Inner East Bay. Oakland, Berkeley, and Richmond. 

Here’s the market activity for Oakland over the past 2 months for single family detached homes, not including condos or townhouses. The number of active listings has started to slow down considerably from this year's high water mark of 620 on September 11, and the number of homes going under contract has also slowed, but homes are going under contract at a faster pace than the general decline in new inventory.

Here’s the market activity for Berkeley over the past 2 months for single family detached homes, not including condos or townhouses. The number of active listings has fallen and plateaued over the past month, but the number of homes going under contract has slowed in the past couple of weeks. The bulk of existing inventory at this point is not being embraced by buyers, most likely due to unrealistic seller expectations. Buyers will need to wait until mid-January at this point before they can expect a variety of new  listings of any great quality, and sellers will need to rethink their strategy for success.

The data for Richmond for single family detached homes, not including condos or townhouses, also points to a slow down in new listings, and with homes going under contract at a reasonably consistent rate over the past month. 

Days on market for Condos & Townhomes is longer than for Single Family Homes by quite a bit. Please let us know if you’d like more detail on this aspect of the market. It's a great time to shop for a condo or townhouse in almost any part of the Inner East Bay. Most real estate agents will tell you that in a market downturn, condos and townhouses are the last type of property to recover. Single family homes tend historically to recover value more quickly following a market downturn. 

Open Homes for Sunday, December 15: Let’s break it down:

Of the 120 single family residential homes that have an open house, 2.5% had a price adjustment. This is a much lower adjustment rate than the prior several weeks. The bulk of price adjusted property, as is typical, is concentrated in Oakland with just a few exceptions. This data reveals that sellers are adjusting the listing price down on underperforming listings ahead of the approaching holiday season, to get more in line with what buyers might be willing to pay.

Of the 68 condos/townhouses that have an open house, 3% had a price adjustment. This is a much lower adjustment rate than the prior several weeks. There continues to be significant opportunities in the faltering condo market in most East Bay cities for potential buyers. The average days on market for condos and townhouses in the Inner East Bay is currently at 78 days. Understanding the cancellation rate of listings is also important and there’s more on that below. 

Listings canceled from the Multiple Listing Service in the past 7 days:

A total of 60 listings were canceled from the Multiple Listing service in the past 7 days across all price points. Here’s the cancellation data for the past 2 months, and it’s interesting to note the peak in cancellations for detached homes in mid-November, and a similar peak for condos and townhomes lagging until late November, dipping a week later and surging again in the past week. 

Most cancellations are in Oakland. Cancellations reveal that sellers are pulling underperforming listings from the market, if they can afford to, in favor of possibly re-listing them in the New Year or, in some cases, renting them. Cancellations are also an opportunity for buyers because the sellers may still be open to offers. The list is worth reviewing. Click here for a full list.

A quick word about mortgage rates in general since home mortgage rates have been top of mind for consumers in the past few years: Since September the Federal Reserve has cut rates by 0.75% basis points but mortgage rates have ticked up in the past month causing confusion among consumers. Federal Reserve rate cuts do not directly correlate to reduced mortgage interest rates. As more seasoned mortgage rate watchers know, a better way to understand the direction of mortgage rates is to track the yield on the 10-year Treasury bond. The 10-year Treasury bond yield is the interest rate the U.S. government pays to borrow money for a decade, serving as a benchmark for other interest rates and a key indicator of investor sentiment about economic conditions. The 10-year yield is used as a proxy for mortgage rates. As the yield on the 10-year Treasury bond increases, typically so too do mortgage interest rates, and as the the yield on the 10-year Treasury bond declines, mortgage interest rates typically follow the same pattern.

Pro-tip: It’s worth also considering the impact of elections on the current year and what historic data can tell us about elections' impact on the following calendar year. Click here for our July 2024 Newsletter with a feature on “The Impact Of Elections”.

Just a reminder, there are some truly gorgeous houses out there to visit this weekend. You may also want to share this weekly deep dive with friends or family in the east bay who might appreciate the opportunity to visit the beautiful open homes on offer, or who, better still, might truly appreciate the consistent care and effort The Home Factor takes with interpreting the real estate market data in the east bay each week.

That’s the wrap up for this weekend! Please don’t hesitate to reach out for custom information. We’re always happy to provide it. Best way to reach us is at declan@thehomefactor.com 
Declan Spring is probably the best real estate agent and realtor working in the East Bay, Berkeley, Albany, El Cerrito, Richmond, El Sobrante, Kensington, Pinole, Hercules, and Oakland. Time and time agin his clients review him with 5 stars and extraordinary compliments. Declan Spring received most of his business by referral. He does not need to rely on traditional marketing because people are always lining up to work with him through word of mouth. He’s known as the realtors realtor because he gets a lot of referral business from industry professionals. How would you like to work with a realtors realtor? Declan Spring has a stellar industry reputation and consumers are generally not aware that being well respected in the agent community and industry is a super power for Declan’s clients.