It is that time again…  I gave FMLS a couple of days to see if there were any fast revisions on the sales data (there was) and now I ready to let fly with the market report covering the preliminary numbers from December and the (probably) final numbers for November.

There were some surprises in there… both good and bad.  For December, the number of new listings was right in line with what I expected, but sales fell short… although there is a chance that the final numbers will improve… I’m not THAT hopeful.  I was looking for another 100 sales, and I just don’t see that happening.

But the big surprise to the good side was pendings.  All year, except for the anomolous month of September, pendings had been running 20% – 30% below last year.  For December, they came in 2% under December 2007.

As I mentioned in the presentation, I can’t say that we are at the bottom, but we can see it from here.  Of course there is a chance that we could skip along the bottom for a while… there are a lot of possible foreclosure properties on the horizon if some of the analysts are correct.  We might also see a strong recovery.  The folks in Washington are trying to make money easier to come by… and there are a LOT of folks out there that have been holding off.  Builders have all but stopped new construction, so existing inventory could see a spike if the buyers move off of the fence en masse.

The bottom line…

At least for now… is that there are some great deals in Gwinnett County, and there are some real dogs that are just clogging the market.  I am also seeing Days on Market (DoM) drop in some price categories.  The drops are radical, too.  some from 95 days last month to 70 days this month.  That points to buyers identifying good deals and snapping them up.  The properties that are selling are selling reasonably fast.

When you are ready to buy, give me a call.  If you are in an area I can’t service well, I will find a great agent to help you that CAN service that area.