House Hunters Have Few Orange County Choices As Year Starts

Orange County house hunters face a big challenge as 2016 gets going: a thin selection of homes to choose from.

ReportsOnHousing.com says there were 4,396 existing homes listed for sale in the brokers network as the year started, down 12 percent from a year ago. It’s the second-lowest supply at the start of a year since 2005. In the past decade, supply has averaged 7,298 listings at the beginning of the year.

“There’s definite pent up demand for homes, but just not enough inventory to match. Typically, that is a recipe for appreciation, low supply and high demand, but not in today¹s market,” writes ReportsOnHousing’s Steve Thomas.

“Instead, buyers are approaching the housing market much more cautiously. They are very aware that homes have already appreciated considerably since 2012, so they are careful to not overpay,” he wrote.

Supply has improved slightly in the past two weeks to 4,576 listings, Thomas noted. But that’s still 679 less than a year ago.

That means Thomas’ estimate of selling time – comparing supply to new escrows opened in past 30 days – was just 86 days as of last Thursday vs. 99 days a year ago.

Thin supply may be dimming demand, as measured by new escrows opened – 1,593 in the 30 days ended Jan. 14, six below a year ago.