Home prices down in LV

Home prices down in LV
Report shows median, sales dip in January
By HUBBLE SMITH
REVIEW-JOURNAL

Feb. 08, 2006
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

The median price of a single-family home dropped by $2,500 in January from the previous month, the Greater Las Vegas Association of Realtors reported.

The $310,000 median is down 0.8 percent from December, though it still reflects an 8.8 percent increase from January 2005. The average price of $382,518 is up 16.4 percent from a year ago.

Home sales dropped to 1,778 in January, down 27 percent from December and 10.4 percent from a year ago. The number of homes available for sale on the Multiple Listing Service grew 23.3 percent to 16,493.

Linda Rheinberger, president of the Greater Las Vegas Realtors Association, said December was an unusually active month for sales and people may have "flopped months."

"Look at days on the market. Sixty percent (of homes) sold in less than 60 days. That's what I look at as telling," she said. "Maybe we need more listings because they're still going

Rheinberger said she attended a regional conference for Realtors in Santa Fe, N.M., and Las Vegas was hailed as the "poster child" for the Rocky Mountain region.

"They're just all over Nevada and Las Vegas about how strong our market is," she said. "The true experts are bullish for '06. So we're not going to play into somebody's hands that they want to make a trend of one month when we're so strong."

She said David Lereah, chief economist for the National Association of Realtors, told her to look for an investment property for him in Las Vegas.

For condominiums and townhomes, the median sales price in January was $196,299, down 3.8 percent from December, but up 9.1 percent from one year ago. The number of attached units sold in January was down 22.5 percent and the number listed for sale increased by 47.7 percent.

Rheinberger said Las Vegas is returning to a more normal housing market, which is to be expected after 20 percent to 40 percent appreciation over the past couple of years.

The Realtors' statistics are based on the MLS and do not account for newly constructed homes sold by local builders and other transactions not involving a Realtor

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