Manchester Vermont Real Estate Blog

We are fortunate in our local real estate market not to have many bank owned properties on the market. According to CNBC.com Vermont has the lowest foreclosure rate in the country as of August, 2010. In reviewing the 135 properties currently on the market in Manchester I could identify only 2 as bank owned properties (sometimes referred to in the industry as REO as in real estate owned by banks).

I started thinking about this aspect of the market because of a property that closed last week. A large and prominent home in Manchester Village, 6,000 square feet on 3 acres, sold for $525,000. The same home sold in February 2005 for $1,575,000, asking price at the time. At some point the owners lost the home to the bank. The bank brought the property on the market in April of this year at $900,000. After a series of price reductions the asking price was eventually lowered to $579,000 at which point it went under contract and sold for the price mentioned above.

The property most likely has a couple of hundred thousand dollars in deferred maintenance, and the cost of heating a large older home like this is probably quite high. Nonetheless some buyer out there got a heck of a deal in my opinion.

On to the weekly recap:

New Listings – 14 new properties came on the market last week ranging in price from $85,900 to $2,150,000.

Price Reductions – 17 properties were reduced in price with an average price reduction of 6.7%.

Under Contract – 5 properties went under contract last week, 4 under $250,000, and 1 between $750,000 - $1 million.

Sold – 4 properties closed last week: one sold for $175,000 which was 88% of asking price, one sold for $195,300 which was 93% of asking price, one sold for $525,000 which was 91% of asking price and one sold for $1,295,000 which was 82% of asking price.