Milton and Alpharetta Combined Market Update

Deciphering boundaries between Alpharetta and Milton can be difficult to manage using the FMLS because too many agents still enter listings that are actually in Milton as "Alpharetta" because they don't understand (this is just my opinion) that there is a specific desire by consumers to search specifically for homes for sale in Milton vs. Alpharetta due to some of the inherent differences between the 2 cities. Complicating the statistics even farther is the very large number of unmapped properties in Milton which makes it impossible to even use the map search feature to accurately ascertain what's happening in Milton compared with other areas.

My experience has been that while there are truly some differences between the two, for the most part, the real estate markets are very similar - especially when only comparing the area of Alpharetta which is west of GA 400. So what I did for these statistics was to only use West Alpharetta which is combined with all of the city of Milton.

• There are currently 556 homes for sale
• There are currently 73 homes under contract
• In the last 30 days, 49 homes have sold
• In the last 60 days, 103 homes have sold
• In the last 90 days, 150 homes have sold

Using the data from the last 90 days, the absorption rate is 11 months based on an average of 50 homes sold per month. This is a few months below the absorption rate in Metro Atlanta at approximately 14 months of supply. The number also show a fairly consistent number of homes selling in each of the three busiest months of summer; June, July and August and the number of home with contracts (73) seems to indicate that we are not tapering off in sales as the summer comes to a close.

Milton real estate is continuing to come into its own more and more and will continue to do so as people seek homes with larger lots in an area still close enough in to benefit from location without having to sacrifice by paying the exorbitant land costs associated with areas closer in town.

The average sales price for homes during the three month summer period of 2008 is $535,627 with a total of 150 sales compared with $549,581 and 232 sales during the same time period one year earlier. This translates into a 35% drop in total homes and a 2.5% decline in home values.

Relative to the larger Metro Atlanta market, Alpharetta and Milton have faired well. We'll see how this mortgage backed securities "fix" plays out and I expect little to change over the next several months to improve the outlook for sellers in 2009 although it should continue to be better than Metro Atlanta as a whole.

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