The lack of inventory tale continued last month with a -23% decrease in Units Listed compared to April 2022 and a -56% decrease compared to April 2019, a pre-pandemic year. This lack of inventory affected last month’s Units Sold (-50%) and Units Pended (-14%) compared to April 2022, Interestingly with only 37 Units Listed, there were still 24 Units Pended which is only a -14% decrease compared to April 2022 and about the same number of Units Pended as April 2019 (25). The April 2023 Days on Market continue to maintain a fairly low level at 42, and the Average Sale Price and Median Sale Price dropped (-21% and -10% respectively) compared to April 2022. As you may recall, April and May of 2022 is when the market experienced a shift because of the increase in interest rates. Clearly the lack of inventory continues to adversely affect sales.
Now let’s take a deeper dive into the April 2023 ASP and MSP to understand sales composition relative to last year. In April 2023 the highest sale was only $1,867,000 compared to $2,640,000 in April 2022. Additionally, in April 2023 there was a higher penetration of sales (64% vs. 46%) in the under $1M price range. Given the aforementioned information, it’s unsurprising that there was a YOY decrease in both the ASP (-21%) and the MSP (-10%). We are appearing to return to pre-pandemic distribution of sales by price-point.
How is Princeton performing year-to-date (YTD)? Units Sold (-46%), Units Listed (-23%), and DOM (-2%) all decreased compared to January-April 2022. As for January-April 2023 versus January-April 2019 (pre-pandemic), Units Sold (-20%), Units Listed (-46%), and DOM (-46%) all decreased. While the low inventory this year is affecting both the number of sales and the DOM, the number of Units Sold is still pretty remarkable.
So what does this all mean? We are now beginning to return to pre-pandemic levels of Units Sold, but are well below the number of Units Listed in previous years. Additionally, while we are still seeing properties sell fairly quickly, opportunities for buyers are starting to emerge.
So what is happening now? There are currently 50 Active Units between $449,900 and $8,500,000, 26 Active Under Contract Units between $350,000 and $12,000,000, and 36 Pending Units between $439,000 and $2,895,000 in Princeton. Lastly, 15 properties were introduced thus far in May between $350,000 and $8,50,000. Three are already under contract and one is already pending.
What will May bring? May could be a busy month for two reasons. First, this is the time when buyers who want to be in before the upcoming school year begin to make their decisions. Second, there could be buyers who were waiting to see what else would come on the market but given the low inventory, may decide to move forward with a purchase.
As always, if you are thinking about buying or selling your home or want to learn more about Princeton area real estate market statistics, feel free to email us! Sig & Syl
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