Holy Cow! No wonder we're so busy.

Anecdotally, the market has been feeling crazy busy these days.  There are lots of cash buyers in the market, which makes for fast and somewhat loose players.  Rapidly rising prices make cash king, as worries of low appraisals are off the table.  Waived, or minimized inspections are also on the rise.  Buyers, please don't take on a potentially leaking oil tank.  Most any other conditions can be reasonably estimated, but an untested tank could get you your very own superfund site.

So, statistically, more rising prices, with the  median price for the first five months of this year up 15.0% over the same period in 2012 to $253,000.  Fifteen percent. 

We have more pending and closed sales, and inventory remains low with 2.5 months of inventory city wide.  That means, at the current rate of sales it would take 2.5 months to sell the properties currently on the market.  In some of the close-in neighborhoods, we see this well below 30 days.   Pending sales increased 1.2% from April 2013 and 18.1 from May 2012.  Closed sales are up 26.2%  over April 2013 and 27.8 % over May 2012.

And our average market time remains low at 85 days, down from 91 last month.   This is an average, so imagine how quickly the good ones are actually selling.

Interest rates are slowly on the rise, as they should be.  For a 30 year fixed rate, one might expect a 4.125% rate, 3.375 for a 15 year rate.  These are still great rates, probably the lowest we'll see in the coming years.  Rising rates, though, do tend to light a fire under "on the fence" buyers...

If you've been thinking of selling, now is a pretty good time.

See the full report.