Las Vegas REO Sales Report

Before the next Gloom and Doom Las Vegas Real Estate report is released from some source like the Case-Shiller index.. I always like to remind our clients that these reports are old news. What happened two months ago has little to do with what you need to know today. Personally, I’ve always thought that somebody reporting on what already happened is just news for the novices to use and a source for the pros to say they were right as highlighted when I wrote a post about the Las Vegas Home Appreciation Maps by Zip Code the Review Journal does every year some time back.

So What Do We Look At?

Honestly… there is no direct science to predicting the future and there never will be because residential real estate involves so much emotion. It’s precisely why the National Association of REALTORS has been so wrong for the past couple of years, information gatherers and reporters of Las Vegas real estate statistics in the Review Journal have been so wrong and so called real estate ”experts” have all been made to look like nothing but sales cheerleaders by the likes of Peter Schiff on Business news channels. It’s precisely why I like to stay out of the prediction game aka speculation game and I certainly suggest anybody that does not understand what tampering with the free markets does (Artificially low interest rates, the loosening of credit, etc.. ALL of which helped contribute to higher then normal appreciation rates for Las Vegas) to stay out of the speculation game also.

There are so many factors that need to be considered that are not always evident to somebody just collecting sales price numbers of what already happened. 

One of these factors is the number of Las Vegas Foreclosures aka Bank Owned Homes aka REO homes available for sale on the Las Vegas MLS. Since Las Vegas foreclosures started becoming a problem and popping up for sale on the Las Vegas MLS, we’ve been tracking them on one of our websites with our Las Vegas Foreclosures for sale on the Las Vegas MLS report. You’ll notice the numbers of Las Vegas Bank Owned homes keeps going up and what you may have read is that prices are still declining. Sales in mid 2008 started increasing over 2007 which was a good thing but was mainly due to declining prices. As bad as that sounds, it’s certainly a good thing as the much needed correction takes place and hopefully someday we can get back to a normal real estate market like we used to experience in the pre-bubble days.

In other words.. you certainly did not need to wait for a news report to figure out that Las Vegas Home prices were going to drop if you just followed the number of Las Vegas foreclosures available for sale. If you understand how the Banks work in selling off their distressed assets and why they do what they do… you certainly knew it was coming.

For our Las Vegas Homes  we have listed for sale, we will not take listings in the first place unless they are going to be priced right to begin with. Using a combination of recent home sales, factoring other conditions such as inventory in the neighborhood and homes in the neighborhood that are in contract helps our homes be priced competitively with what is available. Once they are up and running, I set up a cool little automatic search that notifies me of anything in the neighborhood that changes so we can keep our Las Vegas home sellers informed and make neccesary changes. For the past several months… it’s been lowering the price and another indication that I already know what the next media report on Las Vegas home values is going to say.

For Las Vegas neighborhoods with little current sales activity taking place, I’ll do some very time consuming record searching to do some research. One recent luxury Las Vegas high rise condominium analysis I just did for an owner only had two sales in the entire condominium building for the past six months, two condominium units in contract, 7 Short sales currently available for sale and 1 Bank Owned Condominium available for sale. 45 Condominium units were available for sale with prices all over the place.

Some record searching and research showed me some things taking place that may not be too favorable in the near future as this revealed to me that 11 condominium units had Notices of Default (first stage of the foreclosure process in Nevada) filed since September and 3 more condominium units had the dreaded Notice of Sale filed with one of the condominium units already transferred over to the bank but not yet available for sale.

If you know how the Banks work in getting rid of their non-performing assets, then you probably have a pretty good idea of what may happen but I’m certainly not going to guarantee it. I don’t make predictions but the sellers and any potential buyers I have for this Las Vegas condominium building are certainly going to be informed to cut down on the number of surprises that may take place.

Las Vegas area REO homes currently Available for Sale on the Las Vegas MLS:

7,899

Las Vegas area REO homes currently under contract on the Las Vegas MLS:

3,494

As you can see, there is certainly some good sales activity taking place and great deals being done but not all of the 7,899 Las Vegas Bank Owned Homes are a good deal. If you are interested in seeing them, you can go right here and search for the Las Vegas Bank Owned Homes for sale on the Las Vegas MLS.

If you have any specific questions for your Las Vegas real estate needs, feel free to use the information below to contact me directly.

Paul Francis, CRS
Las Vegas Real Estate
702.592.3058