Right now, it is pretty easy to sell a house in San Jose. (That of course does not mean it’s easy to get top dollar.) A great indicator is the median days, weeks or months to sell. The local MLS to which I belong, MLSListings, can chart various statistics for us, including this one. So today I ran the figures for medians days to sell for San Jose going back five years. The lower the number, the easier it is to sell; as you can see, right now, it’s at the lowest point in five years: good news for home owners who want to sell!
Median days to sell a house in San Jose Jan 2007 to June 2012
How do the numbers break down? Visually we can get a good overall sense of the trends, but having the actual data is helpful too.
| Days to Sell, Median | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Month | 2007 | 2008 | 2009 | 2010 | 2011 | 2012 |
| Jan | 52 | 76 | 76 | 23 | 54 | 31 |
| Feb | 27 | 68 | 56 | 17 | 34 | 22 |
| Mar | 18 | 45 | 57 | 15 | 29 | 18 |
| Apr | 23 | 45 | 49 | 16 | 30 | 15 |
| May | 25 | 43 | 45 | 24 | 25 | 14 |
| Jun | 28 | 48 | 26 | 24 | 34 | 13 |
| Jul | 39 | 42 | 22 | 29 | 31 | |
| Aug | 35 | 45 | 19 | 36 | 32 | |
| Sep | 49 | 59 | 18 | 38 | 32 | |
| Oct | 51 | 43 | 21 | 46 | 39 | |
| Nov | 64 | 66 | 18 | 55 | 38 | |
| Dec | 66 | 69 | 21 | 59 | 42 | |
What I like about seeing the numbers in this format is the ease for comparing the same month in prior years. The most recent completed month is June, so let’s consider this June and those before. In June 2012 it was a fast 13 median days to sell. A year ago it was 34, the year prior to that 24, in 2009 26, 2008 48 (horrible for sellers!) and in 2007 28. The six year average for June, including this year, is 28 days. Homes now in San Jose are at less than half that for median days to sell!
The odds of selling a home are largely about supply and demand. Right now inventory is low and demand is high. The chances are good for success in selling this year if you do everything right (pre-sale preparation, hiring a good agent, marketing, etc.).
