Below is a new report (courtesy of our friends at First Centennial Title) that I have not posted on this blog before. This report compiles monthly traffic and sales data from the area’s builders and subdivisions. One of the things I like about this report is that the monthly data goes back ten years; allowing new home sales trends to be observed.
Click on the report below to enlarge.
Some observations that come to mind:
- January 2015’s traffic number was down (about 10%) from January 2014; however the sales for the month (62 new home sales) was the same as reported for January 2015.
- 2015 looks to be off to a good start sales-wise. Notice that January’s 62 new sales is double the number of new home sales in January 2013.
- Taking a look at yearly total sales (the YTD column), we can see that 806 new homes were sold in 2014. This number was up 2.5 percent over 2013’s 786 new houses sold.
- The “YTD” column shows that total new home sales have been trending up since hitting a low in 2011.
What observations do you make from the data in the chart?
Geoffrey Parlane
Dumb question – Traffic means people (prospective buyers or looky lou’s) visting the model homes?
Guy Johnson
Geoffrey, yes, foot traffic through the mode homes.
Geoffrey
Even the best conversion rate of 4%, (sales to foot traffic) still seems low. I guess driving around and looking at cool new homes and design ideas is still free. Guy, it would be interesting to know what the (approximate) conversion rate is for resale homes. In my experience, I’m probably only at a .20 avg.
Guy Johnson
Geoffrey, that would be an interesting comparison. I’m guessing a minimum of 10% conversion.
Another thing to keep in mind is that multiple offer situations [not uncommon in this market] will skew the data. Example: 20 prospective buyers visit a resale property; five write offers on the property (25%); only one offer is accepted (5%). Which number do you use?