Triangle Area Real Estate News & Information

Mid Year Real Estate Review:

The numbers are in and I've been busy crunching them (along with the carrots from our garden) and overall I have to say that things look better for the first half of 2012 then they did for the same time period in 2011. Here's a quick overview with the areas I regularly work in broken out individually.

Orange County Real Estate Report

At the end of June we were sitting on roughly 9 months of inventory for sale down from over a years worth of inventory form the same time last year. Overall TTD sales were up by 7.8% in Orange County, however the average sales price was down by 5.2% to $321,258. In total $204,000,000 worth of residential real estate transactions closed in the first 6 months of the year.

When I look at the Chapel Hill / Carrboro school district area within Orange County, the numbers mirror those of the County with one significant difference. Chapel Hill and Carrboro has always been the most expensive area within the county and this is still the case, but where Orange County only saw a drop in average sales price of 5.2% Chapel Hill and Carrboro saw an average drop of nearly 9% to $356,027. Back in 2006 and 2007 (considered the height of the market, the average sales price was over $400,000)*

Durham County Real Estate Report

Durham's numbers show that it has indeed weathered the storm better than the Triangle (Raleigh- Durham- Chapel Hill) as a whole. This is in large part to Durhams' doing a superior job in terms of marketing itself as well as a growing perception that Durham is the place to be. Considered to be the culinary capitol of the state for many years, it continues to really stand out in this area with exciting new restaurants opening almost monthly. In addition it's Arts scene continues to gather both regional and national attention, and it's business friendly attitude and the recognition as having one of the most vibrant new technology / entrepreneur demographics in the country help explain this. Sales YTD were up 21% over the same period last year and the average price sales price was up by just under 2% to $193,053. In total $322,000,000 in residential sales closed through the end of June.

What I found absolutely fascinating was the disparity between North and South Durham. If you were to draw a line directly through Durham County with Duke and Downtown being in the upper most part of the Southern half of the county, and then compared the two halves, you see that Southern Durham continues to significantly outperform Northern Durham. Southern Durham saw an increase in sales of 28% YTD and the average price went up by 3.5% to $230,544 while Northern Durham during the same time period saw its average price drop by nearly 11% to $168,879 even while total sales YTD climbed by 13.4%. Southern Durham had only 7.1 months of inventory on market while Northern Durham had 9.1 months. Interestingly enough as a Durham resident I see tremendous value in North Durham and continue to see new development throughout the county. *

Chatham County Real Estate Report

Chatham County – Chatham County still continues to lag behind but not nearly as much as it has the past few years. In total there still too much inventory on the market with 11.5 months. However this is down from 17 months last year. Average prices have come up a little but by less than 1/2% to $297,509 and total sales volume is up 21.3% accounting for $103,200,000 in total YTD sales. *

*Keep in mind that this is a macro view and these numbers can vary widely over various price ranges. If you're interested in a specific price range or type of property, feel free to contact me directly for a more detailed micro view.