Freezing Long Island Ranked Hottest Market in January

Sacramento?  San Diego?  Nope, the nation’s hottest market in a frigid January was the Nassau-Suffolk CBSA according to Pro Teck Valuation Services’ January Home Value Forecast (HVF) update and much warmer Jacksonville ranked at the bottom with more than 80 percent of home sales due to foreclosure sales.

“Long Island leads Home Value Forecast’s ranking as the hottest real estate market in the nation in our January Home Value Forecast,” said Tom O’Grady, CEO of Pro Teck Valuation Services. “Many factors account for Long Island’s strong market, including foreclosures making up an inconsequential 2.18 percent of sales and available housing inventory at only 3.63 months. Looking at the extended forecast, we see Long Island reaching peak highs again within five years.”

This month’s Home Value Forecast update also includes a listing of the 10 best and 10 worst performing metros as ranked by its market condition ranking model. The rankings are run for the single family home markets in the top 200 CBSAs on a monthly basis.  They highlight the best and worst metros with regard to a number of leading real estate market indicators, including: sales/listing activity and prices, months of remaining inventory (MRI), days on market (DOM), sold-to-list price ratio and foreclosure and REO activity.

“In our January HVF top ten, California is again well represented, with six of our top 10 metros from the state. In particular, the Los Angeles market has seen a major shift, with sales prices up over 24 percent from the last rolling quarter,” added O’Grady.

January’s top CBSAs include:

Nassau County-Suffolk County, NY

Los Angeles-Long Beach-Glendale, CA

Ann Arbor, MI

Anaheim-Santa Ana-Irvine, CA

Oxnard-Thousand Oaks-Ventura, CA

San Diego-Carlsbad, CA

San Luis Obispo-Paso Robles-Arroyo Grande, CA

Santa Maria-Santa Barbara, CA

Ashville, NC

Houston-The Woodlands-Sugar Land, TX

“Comparing Long Island (Nassau-Suffolk) to our bottom CBSA this month, Jacksonville, FL, brings it all into focus.  While Long Island had less than 3 percent of its sales as foreclosures, Jacksonville is experiencing 81.15 percent of its sales as foreclosures, which means ‘banks’ are the seller in more than four of every five homes purchased,” added O’Grady. “Looking at the five year forecast, Jacksonville’s prices are not expected to get anywhere near its 2007 peak. Foreclosures will continue to hamper the market from returning to true market fundamentals for the foreseeable future.”

The bottom CBSAs for January were:

Montgomery, AL

Port St. Lucie, FL

Cape Coral-Ft. Myers, FL

Elkhart-Goshen, IN

Grand Junction, CO

Jacksonville, NC

Mobile, AL

Saginaw, MI

Homosassa Springs, FL

Jacksonville, FL