Condo market tightens

Overall supply for the North Shore condo market tightened as of September 1st to just 3.4 months of supply, down from 4.7 months earlier in the summer. As with SFHs, supply is tightest at lower price levels.

Source: MLS, Oliver Reports

The trend for individual North Shore cities and towns, as well as for Essex County and Massachusetts, for the last six months is shown here:

Source: MLS, Oliver Reports

While the market generally has been tight all summer, note that in Marblehead the inventory has dropped from 9.1 to 5.4 months.  Swampscott’s inventory remains above the 6 months’ level.

Clearly, the condo market on the North Shore generally has become very tight over the summer, possibly because as SFHs became harder to find more buyers considered condos. Another factor could be that condo buyers, who may typically be a younger person starting out on home ownership, would be more willing to consider an adjustable rate mortgage where the interest rate on a 5/1 is about 1.5% less than that on a 30 year fixed mortgage.

Finally, here are the actual numbers:

Source: MLS, Oliver Reports

Note that 6 of the 17 North Shore cities and towns I monitor are not included in the condo list because their sales are too small for the numbers to be meaningful.

If you are considering buying or selling a home and have questions about the market and/or current home prices, feel free to contact me on 781.631.1223 or [email protected].

Andrew Oliver is a Realtor with Harborside Realty in Marblehead.