The available homes for sale in the Naples area saw a drop in the number of homes for sale as of the end of April or start of May. The current number of homes for sale is 4756. This represents a drop in the inventory of 441 homes. The decline represents of about 8 percent. In the year over year analysis the current inventory represents a decline of 1037 homes or about 18 percent. In addition, the number of home available for sale is at the lowest level since January 2008. in January 2008 there was a total of 6270. Therefore, the decline is 1514 or about 24 percent. Below is a graphical presentation of the historical data for active listings by month from January 2008 to April 30, 2009.

The composition of the type of listings available for sale is rather interesting and could represent a major difference between prospective buyers’ perceptions, as well as, what is being reported by others as to how dire the Naples real estate market is. The vast majority of listings fall within the traditional listing category (traditional listings are listings being offered as a normal sale), followed by foreclosures, and potential short sales. The raw numbers for the various categories are 3624 for traditional listings, 951 potential short sales and 181 foreclosures.

A question arises – does the closed sales for April reflect the classification of the listings? The answer to this question will appear on this blog sometime between May 8 and May 11.

Your thoughts and comments are always welcomed.