Mt. Hood Real Estate Sales Up 30% in 2012!
Check out the last ten years of Mt. Hood Sales. 2012 was the highest number of sales since 2007!
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Displaying blog entries 201-210 of 358
Check out the last ten years of Mt. Hood Sales. 2012 was the highest number of sales since 2007!
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December finished with a bang for Mt. Hood real estate sales in 2012! We finished out the fourth quarter with an astonishing 45 sales! Fourteen were credited for the last month of the year. Despite appraisal challenges and buyer and home qualifying issues the numbers speak for themselves.
Here are the fourteen winners in December!

Four sales in Government Camp led the pack with three Condo units including a luxury Grand Lodges unit selling for $367,000 and the other two were Collins Lake condos.
Only two foreclosure sales to report . There’s only four bank owned properties currently for sale! REO’s or bank owned properties are being usurped by loan modifications and short sales.
Short sales may dominate 2013 over foreclosures with an extension of the Homeowner’s Forgiveness Act just passing this month! Short sales made up 5% of the 2012 sales market.
Mt. Hood area real estate statistics are in for the 2012 selling season. There are some” good news” numbers to report! The biggest is that the average sale price is up 4.4% as reported by multiple listing service. More good news: total number of sales are up 30% over 2011.

As the built up existing inventory gets sold we will eventually see more stabilization in the market and hopefully a rise in prices.
December saw a big decline of 50% pending sales compared to last year. No doubt this was because of the uncertainty of the fiscal cliff talk and the holiday shopping sprees that occupied each weekend.
Government Camp homes and condos finally broke out of its slow down for several years. Eleven condos in Government Camp closed and many single family homes went out the door with nine total.
foreclosures are slowing nationally down to 20% of sales. Government Camp, Rhododendron, Welches and Brightwood had 28 bank owned sales and seven short sales. We’re 6% higher than the national average in distressed sales!
Continued low interest rates and plenty of inventories to purchase will make 2013 another block buster year for sales. Although qualifying and appraisals make this market challenging we are optimistic that these obstacles will be met.
One of the most often sought after properties on Mt. Hood are Mt Hood National Forest cabins located mostly above Rhododendron on up to just before the climb to Government Camp along Hiway 26. These cabins were mostly built in the 1930’s and 1940s by Portlanders who wanted a summer getaway thus the term “Summer Homes” used by the Forest Service.
Since that time the cabins have turned into much more than “Summer Homes”. Many skiers who want a weekend getaway close to Mt. Hood’s ski slopes find these cabins the perfect affordable option compared to the higher priced condos and chalets in Government Camp.
Cabin sales make up around 17% of market sales in 2012. The cabins are anywhere from rustic hand crafted cabins to completely remodeled and updated cabins fully insulated with gourmet kitchens and hardwood floors.
The best part about National Forest cabins are the locations. Several waterways meander through the woods including Still Creek, Camp Creek and the Zig Zag River which crosses both sides of Hiway 26. Waterfront cabins are some of the most popular for buyers. The pristine forested setting and regulated ownership requirements of the permit keep this area one of the most beautiful, undisturbed and anesthetic experience you can have on Mt. Hood.
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Still Creek on a snowy day.
There are 15 cabins currently for sale in the Mt. Hood National Forest. Contact me at [email protected] for a complete list!
Let’s take a look at the whopping 18 closed sales for the month of November on Mt. Hood listed below. The leased land cabins in the Mt. Hood National Forest came on gang busters with seven closed cabins. This is definitely a record breaking month for cabins. Typically summer months bring buyers out in droves for cabins but this year the fall brought cabin buyers out of the woods. The other strong segment of sales were cabins that were on fee simple land, or in other words, on their own land. These ranged in the areas of $100,000 to $200,000 mostly.
Timberline Rim racked up two sales and Zig Zag Village totaled one sale. Both of these subdivisions offer amenities of swimming pools and tennis courts which many homeowners prefer especially with kids.
The good news is that the more inventories that get sold the closer the mountain is to price stabilization.
If this isn’t the best time in history to buy on the mountain, I don’t know what is! Record low interest rates and plenty of cabins and homes to choose from makes a mountain purchase on the TO DO list for 2013!
Check out these offerings for your preferred pricing point:
Mt. Hood Homes and Cabins under $200,000
Mt. Hood Homes and Cabins between $200,000 and $250,000
Mt. Hood Homes and Cabins between $250,000-$300,000
Mt. Hood Homes and Cabins between $300,000 and $400,000
Mt. Hood Homes and Cabins between $400,000 and $500,000

Market statistics have just been released by multiple listing for the month of November. We’ve had the highest number of sales since the beginning of the year and nearly double last months numbers! With eighteen Mt. Hood sales, this is a record breaker! The average sales price for the month is $156,300 showing a lot of sub $200,000 homes have sold during the month. As far as the numbers go, we are nearly up 20% over 2011.

It's been an active fall for sales in the Mt. Hood area. Here are the market action stats for this past October. As November is quickly coming to a close we expect current trends to continue in a postive manner.
RMLS market action shows that pending sales are up 66% for the month of October. There are 25 pending sales currently in RMLS . Part of this high number of pending sales are short sales waiting for approval from lenders and they carry over for months. This could definitely give a false sense of a realistic view of the market. The good news is that by the end of October we have as many sales as we had in 2011. We will likely see an increase of 20% in number of sales over last year by the end of this year.
The eleven sales show average marketing days as 315! Plenty of inventory shows we have not come close to a buyers market yet. The monthly cost to purchase today is incredibly low historically. If you are looking to purchase on the mountain today's inventory has a lot to choose from! Check out the stats below!

How are mountain properties shaping up in the distressed property department?
96 residential sales as of 10/30/2012
23 Bank Owned
6 Short Sales
30% are Distressed sales on the mountain
Here is an info chart for distressed sales in the Portland metro area.

This year has seen a huge increase in sales so far! The nine closed sales for September are listed below. The majority of these purchases were for second homes. Buyers are taking advantage of these lowest ever interest rates and getting their mountain getaway. Sales included two forest service cabins and two Government Camp rec homes!
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Here are the numbers straight from multiple listing service of sales for September 2012. Although slightly down with eleven closed sales, this had been a banner year for the highest "number of sales" in nearly 5 years! After sales increase in numbers we will eventually have some price stabilization.
It's still a buyer's market for the mountain with all residence, including condos and manufactured homes hitting a 13.4 months worth of inventory. It's the perfect time to get that second home in the Cascades!
Displaying blog entries 201-210 of 358