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The FMLS puts together statistical reports monthly from their data and this chart is something I meant to post about a week ago. Sorry to be a little late on the most recent numbers, but, here they are. This chart reflects closed sales over the past 6 years. It may illustrate the market better than just about anything I've done recently.

I apologize that this isn't the fanciest chart you may have seen, but, I didn't make it. The point here is that for all of the pontificating about the market not being as bad as the media says, the truth is that it is quite bad - for sellers.

Atlanta real estate is definitely not hurting as bad as many areas, but there can be no question that we are hurting. In economic terms, this would border on depression. Remember…

In a previous post, I talked about the how and why I think that good single property websites can help to market our listings. At that time, I had really just implemented them for all of my listings and wanted to get back to something that I said I would do about what some best practices might be for reusing them. Before I get that far, I do want to say that I can in fact say that it was one of the single property websites that sold a listing that we closed on this past week.

The story, as relayed to me from the buyer whom I did not represent, explicitly told his agent that he was not interested in a home like the one that he bought (contemporary), but, the agent saw the single property website that also doubled as the virtual tour and forwarded him the…

A $60 investment is all that is needed to make your listings shine. For the last year or so I have struggled with how to improve the photos that I take for my listings and to be honest, I always considered it one of my weaker points. Unfortunately, it's one of, if not the most important aspect in marketing a listing. After all, no matter how many eyeballs you get to view a home online, if the photos are terrible or even average, it's difficult to get a buyer excited about the home. I went through several cameras, fooled with all of the settings and still there was no good solution.

As I was organizing my basement one day, I stumbled across an old halogen lamp like the ones you see at construction sites that I used to use when I rehabbed homes so I decided…

About two months ago, I posted about a new single property website using WordPress that I developed for added exposure to our listings. I had several people email and call me to see if they could use the WordPress theme for their listings. It took a while, but, I finally got the theme in a condition that would be easy enough for anyone who is familiar with hosting their own WordPress blog to use. For reference, here is an example of one that I created for a listing in Sandy Springs.

Be forewarned as if you are unfamiliar with setting up WordPress from scratch, this would probably not be the best place to start. It could be done as I have included a fairly reasonable read me file to get it up and running correctly, but, it is a bit time consuming if you…

Last week I read a post from Eric Blackwell with his new open house platform for agents in his office. I really liked the idea and set out to create something for my market for my listings. Open houses, I think, might just be the best place to use maps. I would think even better than for a general consumer searching homes. The difference is that consumers searching for open houses are likely to be local and will be less intimidated by seeing a map of the city unlike a consumer from Omaha looking to relocate to Atlanta.

So maps are the perfect format for open houses. My new page featuring Atlanta open houses is simple and easy to use. It also allows consumers to get their eyes wrapped around custom single property websites, which, are showcased and linked…

It's no secret that across the country, much of the problem with real estate markets is the supply of homes available for sale. This is the simple economic principle of supply and demand. Below is a chart of the Atlanta market dating back to 1994.

Homes for sale in Atlanta have been on a steady increase as has Metro Atlanta's population so an increase in available housing is to be expected. However, this type of increase is not something that the real estate market is capable of absorbing for long periods of time. When underwriting standards constrict combined with difficulties caused by the sub prime mortgage, affordability goes down. This furthers the trend of rising inventories.

Until prices come down, we will continue to see inventories rise.…

The overall Atlanta market is not really moving in a positive direction for sellers right now; if anything, inventory is still rising. In some areas, however, things are beginning to either level off or move in a more positive direction. John's Creek is one of those areas that has been stagnant for some time. Here are some statistics for John's Creek.

• Currently there are right at 950 active listings in John's Creek with an additional 156 homes working on offers. This is a relatively good sign as pending sales do a decent job of indicating future performance.
• In the last 30 days of accurate sales results, 64 homes have sold. This yields an absorption rate of about 15 months of supply. The average sales price during that time is $357,000.
• In…

As a consumer there is no question - the market is down. But, what does that mean, how does it affect you and what is the most important indicator? Well, there are lots of long winded answers with plenty of nuance and different people might give slightly different answers. To me, and I think to most, the most important part of the market is what the value of homes are and where they are trending. Most of the other things like supply and demand, the amount of foreclosures, pending sales, absorption rates and the like all filter in to the bigger equation of value. So here in Atlanta, the value of homes are down. Way down. Here is a chart going back a year showing the value of Atlanta real estate which has been on a steady decline.

I think this chart…