Redwood City Market Update April 2015
- Very hot market
- Sales jump – again
- Inventory falls 30%
- Inventory half of year-ago level
- Homes selling for 114% of list price
Pending sales in Redwood City were way up for the second straight month. Closed sales are following in step, driving inventory down. Prices were relatively flat from March but that is not to say things have cooled off any. Homes still sold for over 114% of their list price in April and did not stay on the market for long.
The median sales price has been relatively flat for the past few months and actually fell $11,000 from March to $1,352,000 in April. That’s still the second highest median sales price here, bested only by last month’s. And April’s price was 36% ($357,759) higher than a year ago. The price per square foot also dipped a little from March’s high of $846 to $812 in April. Twelve months ago, the price per square foot was $114 lower at $698. The average sale in April was for 114% of the list price, up from 112% in March and 110% a year ago.
Closed sales remained high in April, following the surge in pending sales the prior month. 49 sales closed during April, off three from March’s 52 and seven less than April 2014’s 56.
77 sales went to contract in April, 43% more than in March (54) and 40% more than a year ago (55). Inventory fell 30%, from 81 at the end of March to 57 at the end of April. April ended with less than half the inventory of April 2014 (116). The result was that less than a three week supply was on the market at the end of April, compared to 1.5 months at the end of March and 1.1 months a year ago.
Buying a home here requires acting quickly. The average property was on the market an average of 20 days in April. That is up from 14 days in March and on par with April 2014’s 19 days.
Analysis by Price Range
It is getting increasingly difficult to find a home her priced at or below $750,000. Only nine homes in this segment were actively listed at the end of April. That compares to 24 a year ago. Seven sales went to contract in April, up one from March but below the ten that went pending a year ago. Inventory relative to sales dropped from 1.7 months at the end of March to 1.3 months at the end of April. Only 16% of Redwood City’s inventory and 9% of its sales were in this segment.
Pending sales of homes priced from $750,000 to $1,499,999 surged 46% in April, while inventory fell 37%. 54 sales went pending during April, compared to 37 in March. 29 homes were actively listed at the end of April, compared to 46 at the end of March. That left a supply of about two weeks at the end of April, down from 1.2 months at the end of March. This price range accounted for 51% of Redwood City’s inventory and 70% of its pending sales.
As prices have increased, so has the share of the market priced at $1.5 million or more. 16 sales went to contract in this segment in April, the most here in at least ten years and probably the most ever. That was up from 11 in March. 19 homes were actively listed at the end of April. We are nowhere near the high point of inventory for this market segment, set in 2007 with 70 properties. Inventory relative to sales was cut from 2.3 months at the end of March to 1.2 months at the end of April. 33% of inventory and 21% of sales were priced at $1.5 million-plus.
