The median home price in Bradenton is now nearly $500K after a record-setting January
If January is any indication, the record setting increase in the median price of existing single-family houses seen over the past year in the Bradenton area may not have yet run its course.
The median price hit $480,000 in January, a 29.7 % increase from the same month a year ago when the median was $370,000, the Realtor Association of Sarasota and Manatee said this week.
The price of housing for buyers and renters has become a crisis throughout the region, Bemetra Simmons, president and CEO of the Tampa Bay Partnership, recently told a Manatee Chamber of Commerce audience.
While the pandemic-induced flight of New Yorkers, Californians and others has helped exacerbate the housing problem in Florida, housing affordability has become a national problem.
“Affordability challenges and limited supply created barriers to home purchasing for many prospective buyers. Meanwhile, consumer confidence fell in the latter half of the year, due in part to rising inflation, pushing many to hold on big-ticket purchases like homebuying. These factors have driven elevated demand for single-family rentals and put increased pressure on the market as vacancy rates also hit historical lows,” CoreLogic, a global property information, analytics and data-enabled solutions provider, said this month.
In January, there were 539 closed sales in the Bradenton area, and 193 of those were all-cash deals. The median time to a contract after a house went on the market was seven days. With only about a one-half month supply of houses in inventory, competition among buyers has been fierce.
Condo and townhouse sales in the Bradenton area have likewise been brisk with a median price of $301,000 in January, a 30% increase from the $231,000 buyers paid a year earlier. More than half of all condo sales were all-cash deals.
Tellingly, all existing single-family homes and condos sold in the Bradenton area in January were at 100% or more of the asking price.
In Sarasota County, the median price for existing single-family houses sold in January was up 36.6% to $464,500 from a year ago. The median price for condos was up 15.8% to $350,000, compared to a year ago.
“New listings tend to rise in delayed response to the increase in prices, and inventory rises when new listings outpace the number of properties that go off-market,” said Realtor association president Tony Veldkamp said in a press release.
“In January, there were more new listings than closed sales in the region. While it’s too early to determine whether this is a trend that will continue through 2022, it is a figure that we will be watching closely. As sellers see a continued increase in home prices and interest rates, which eventually will lead toward more supply, they have to decide whether to take advantage of now being the ‘time to sell’ before the market levels off,” Veldkamp said.
Single-family inventory decreased year-over-year by 46.7% in Sarasota and by 39.1% in Manatee. The year-over-year inventory for condos decreased by 69.9% in Sarasota and by 67.8% in Manatee County.
“The Sarasota and Bradenton area is growing rapidly with many out-of-state buyers entering our market. That is especially true this time of year when more ‘snowbirds’ are enjoying the Florida winter lifestyle,” Veldkamp said. “As buyers see the increase in home prices and interest rates, they are in a tough competition to get into the market before their purchasing opportunity is out-of-reach.”
The average commitment rate for a 30-year, conventional, fixed-rate mortgage was 3.45% in January, up from 3.1% in December, according to Freddie Mac.
