One good measure to gauge the strength of the real estate market is to see how many of the offered houses are under contract. Not only does this give a number which is comparable across time it also gives a good indication about what sales will be in the near future. A leading indicator of sorts.
The Mason-Dixon line of real estate is 15% of the current market under contract. That is of each 100 houses currently on the market 15 of those have a buyer. Below 15% and the market is considered slow and above that number the situation gets progressively better.
Right now, if you look at all areas and price ranges, Boulder County has an under contract ratio of 13%, a slow market by the standards we just discussed. But let’s look at this a bit more closely. I have been telling you for months that the real estate market in Boulder County is drawn differently across different price ranges. The lower price ranges doing better and the higher price ranges doing worse. Under $1 million, 23% of all homes offered for sale are under contract. This is a strong market. The charts below break this ratio into different areas (both single family and attached dwellings) and price ranges.
