Perrysburg Blog

Our local paper was kind enough to interview me for a comment on their story about the recent NAR housing price numbers - which show that Toledo is now a very, very affordable town to buy a home in.

One number that I shared with them was the huge price drop in one zip code in Toledo.  A 75% price drop in January 2009 vs. 2007.

How can that be?

75%???

The answer is that over 50% of the sales in the City of Toledo in January were distressed sales.

So these numbers - these horrible numbers are skewed.

Because of WHO is selling and WHY they are selling.

After all, it’s not “regular owners” who are selling.

It’s the banks that they now own!

Median prices of homes in Toledo - which depending on how you measure them - can actually NOT indicate their current value.    These numbers represent the average disposal prices that it takes to clear them in this market in view of their status as assets that need to be disposed of by financial owners.

A better measure of value is the Case-Shiller index of RESOLD HOUSES.

More on that later . . .

Sellers need not despair.  Not now.

Now, I am not one to dwell on the negative.  I have been accused of being permanently cheerful.   To that I plead guilty - for I am my father’s son.

However, I will always try to tell it like it is.

Always.

And some wonder if the publishing of detailed Perrysburg real estate stats and trends is a good thing to do.  We must remain “positive” after all . . . .

It is a good thing to do.   Do you want to be surprised?!?!

No.

But you OUGHT to be thankful.

Our little price retrenching is NOTHING compared to what is happening in other markets.

You may argue that the huge price drops in Florida, Arizona, Nevada, and California are not harmful at all - not if you bought your house in 1990.

Well, alot of people bought in 2007 and 2006.

What is their market like?  Observe these median price drops for just 1 year in So. Cal. -

Makes our -18% look very, very good.

Perrysburg - it never went up that high.  It won’t crash down that low.

Something to be thankful for today.