Oconee County, GA Real Estate Trends and Market Stats

In this post I will be dealing with West Oconee, GA specifically. This area of the county includes Ashland, Bear Creek, Bogart, Cobblestone Park, Deerwood Estates, Lane Creek Plantation, Mallard Lakes, Oconee Crossing, Planter’s Ridge, Power Ridge, Rocky Branch Farms, The Georgia Club, and every other neighborhood that I didn’t mention in Bogart and Bishop, GA!

As part of my job I try and keep up with market trends for the area. One way that I feel I can accurately achieve this is through not only looking at a 12-month glimpse of residential home sales, but also looking at a month to month comparison of these sales taking into account a “rolling” 12-month perspective. What we see in our current West Oconee market is the following;

		West Oconee
Yr Ending	DOM	Average		Median		# sold
1-Jun-08	216	275,841		246,000		146
1-Jul-08	215	273,702		239,400		150
1-Aug-08	219	272,041		236,750		153
1-Sep-08	228	269,728		236,750		147
1-Oct-08	228	274,053		246,000		139
1-Nov-08	231	269,791		237,450		128
1-Dec-08	228	273,065		242,450		128
1-Jan-09	240	271,790		237,450		127
1-Feb-09	238	269,326		237,425		134
1-Mar-09	230	263,368		234,750		133
1-Apr-09	235	265,010		234,088		134
1-May-09	245	260,463		231,675		119
1-Jun-09	262	270,819		238,175		114

What this chart shows is that in each of the last 12 “twelve-month” periods (1-Jun-07 thru 1-Jun-08 and so on) we have had an increase in DOM (Days on Market) from 216 days to 262 days for the year ending June 1, 2009 and decreases in the “number” of homes sold by 22 percent.

Contrary however to the media’s press on the fabled “national real estate market,” in West Oconee, GA the average and median prices on homes sold has only dropped slightly less than 2 percent from year end 1-Jun-08 to 1-Jun-09. Again, this is not “just” a glimpse into the past year, but also a view into each successive 12-month period going back over a year. Home prices actually seem to be going “up” since the year ending March 1, 2009.

What we see however in West Oconee is “similar” to Watkinsville and Oconee overall, but better. Watkinsville has seen an increase in Days on Market from 184 days to 191. Numbers of residential home sales has decreased however by 42 percent. Prices also seem to be slightly up since the year end June 2008, but down since the year ending February 2009. Oconee County on the whole has seen a 10 percent increase in Days on Market and a 30 percent decrease in the numbers of homes sold. This mirrors Athens-Clarke pretty well.

Overall this defies the economics we learned in school. High inventory, high Days on Market, and reduced numbers of units sold should bring prices down. I guess this is something in which we can be thankful.

Finally, in the Greater Athens area foreclosures and pre-foreclosures, according to Trulia.com, make up “only” 8-10% of listings for sale. Compare this to 42% of Atlanta listings are distressed sales. This is in my belief why we don’t see such a drastic drop in prices in the Greater Athens area as opposed to Atlanta and other larger metro areas.

If you are a buyer in our market, these are probably the best buying conditions in 30 years! If you would like to search the Athens MLS with MapTracks please take a look at listings in our “Classic City” today! On this web MLS search solution you can search every listing on the Georgia MLS for the Greater Athens area or in your Georgia town!