Thursday, December 20, 2012

Connecticut's Slow Recovery

Recent press releases by those studying CT economics suggest that our recovery here still has a long way to go.  New Haven is first among 142 metro areas as a buyers' market, meaning that prices are still flat or declining, making it a good place to buy.  This is a little misleading, because the flip side is that prices never went down the way they did in places like Arizona and Florida, which are at the top of the list as far as sellers' markets go.  The reason is that they have little inventory now, and low prices.

We are also near the bottom on a national basis for recovery statistics.  Our unemployment is at 8.8%, vs. 7.7% nationwide.  Our state has only recovered 25% of the jobs lost, as opposed to 52% nationally.  A list of states by recovery amount puts us 46th.

The most interesting thing about these facts to me is that we are busy in commercial at Pearce!  I have been meeting this week with agents, and they are mostly very optimistic and have a lot going on.  We will finish the year at least double last year's totals, and have some fairly big transactions left to close in early 2013.  I am also getting inquiries about commercial real estate as a career, and have hired two agents in the past month.  That hasn't happened in a long time!

What this suggests is that the Pearce results may reflect market share increases, as opposed to market increases, but that the sector is primed to take off, and that 2013 will be an even better year.  So it won't be a buyers' market for long--act now!

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