“For sale” signs are getting rarer in the Bay Area, driving up already white-hot demand for homes.
Some 486 San Francisco homes hit the market in January, 42 percent fewer than the same month a year ago, the San Francisco Business Times reported. Excluding condos, that’s just 60 single-family homes, a decline of more than half.
Listings have dropped by at least 40 percent in every Bay Area town, and the number has plummeted by more than half in Marin and Napa Counties. That helps explain the frenzy among buyers.
“It’s not abnormal to see 20 and 30 offers on a property,” Don Datanagan at Coldwell Banker Realty told the outlet. “Recently there was a property that received over 40 offers, with four offers from our office alone. ”
Prices are rising fast in historically less expensive neighborhoods such as the Sunset and Excelsior, according to Compass Real Estate’s Patrick Carlisle. A four-bedroom home near the Twin Peaks neighborhood, meantime, sold for $1 million more than its $2.5 million asking price after just three days on the market.
Inventory in the North Bay is next to nothing, Carlisle said, and open houses have been flooded with potential homebuyers trying to grab the few available properties. It isn’t much different in the East Bay, where Carlisle said some agents have reported receiving bids that are $300,000 to $500,000 over asking.
Competition is often fiercest in the lower price ranges, meaning the Bay Area’s luxury market has some of the most to offer. A century-old home with a rare backyard swimming pool in Forest Hills hit the market with an asking price of $5.26 million this month. In January, the most expensive condo in San Francisco also hit the market with a record price of $24.5 million.
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San Francisco
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