St. Paul Home sales and Prices by Neighborhood

Numbers are a great way to start the week and these numbers represent home sales in the city of St. Paul, MN by neighborhood for the Month of March 2014.  Even though temperatures were below average home sales and prices were about what I would have expected for the month. Generally as we head into spring the number of home sales increases city wide and the prices go up. I noticed in the Macalester-Groveland neighborhood, and the Payne -Phalen neighborhood  the number of homes that went pending is greater than the number that were put on the market.

The median home sale price for St Paul was around 144K in January, and it was 153,500 for March. The average home sale price is also up by about 4% since January.

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March 2014 numbers

Even though 837 homes are currently for sale in St. Paul many of them have contingent offers on them leaving about 652 with no offers.

The numbers used to make this table came from the Regional Multiple Listing Service (RMLS) which is deemed reliable but not guaranteed.  There is no better source for local home sale data.  No numbers were harmed in the creation of this table.  They were instead imported into a MS Xcel spreadsheet where they were carefully sorted, totaled and averaged. 

For more local data for home sales in St. Paul, MN please see the Local Market Conditions and Home Prices category.

October Home sales

 It is Monday which is a perfect day for looking at some real estate numbers by neighborhood for St. Paul, Minnesota, for the month of October 2013. 

I really do love numbers.  The numbers used to make the table came from the Northstar MLS which is deemed reliable but not guaranteed.

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October numbers – click on table to enlarge

After a couple of months of small increases in the inventory of homes for sale we saw a small decrease in October which is a normal seasonal kind of thing. Prices are still strong but peaked for the year last summer.  Home sales are down from last month which again is part of the normal cycle.  

The number of new listings is down from last month but higher than I had expected.  Perhaps some sellers are taking advantage of the strong market and selling now instead of waiting until the spring.

For more local numbers like these please see Local market Conditions and Home Prices.

Happy Trails

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Morgan Trail

On the 4th of July I biked from downtown St. Paul to Minnehaha park in Minneapolis.  One of my favorite bike rides because of the river and the view of Fort Snelling at the overlook and the lock and dam by the old Ford Plant and of course Minnehaha falls.

As I went along the path I ended up giving people directions and kind of acting as a tour guide.  

  • No Minneapolis isn’t far from St. Paul

  • Sure just go over the Ford Bridge and you will be on the Minneapolis side of the Mississippi River.

  • The bike path kind of follows the river

  • Sure you can go to Minnehaha falls and you can’t miss them, take a left at the end of the Ford Bridge.

  • Yes if you take a right at the end of the bridge you will eventually get to the Stone Arch Bridge.

I love biking on the 4th of July.  I like seeing St. Paulites out and about and doing touristy things.  If you want to bike the trails along the river you will find these little informational stations with maps that show the major landmarks.  Enjoy!

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you are here

July Home sales for St. Paul, MN

 I just love numbers and here are some home sale numbers for July 2012.   Home sales are down slightly from June which is to be expected because we usually peak in May or June.  It is fun to compare this June to June 2011 because every month of the year just looks better as compared to last year. 

While the average home price is up slightly from last month the median home price is down slightly and sitting at $130,000. 

The data used to create the chart comes from the North Star MLS. The data is deemed reliable but not guaranteed. . . .which is alright because there are no guarantees in life. These numbers are for single family homes which includes condos in St. Paul, Minnesota for the month ending July 31 2012.

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July 2012 Home sales

When I first looked at these numbers I thought that the inventory of homes on the market had gone up slightly from last month but they have not.  In fact when I checked it appears that there are only *896 homes on the market in St. Paul that do not have offers on them. Many of the homes with offers on them are waiting for third party approval which means the homes are being short sold and the seller or owner has approved the offer but they are waiting for the bank to say yes. 

In general the real estate market is stronger than it was last year.  Home prices are being held down by appraisals and other economic factors.  There is currently a shortage of some types of homes but the sellers are hanging onto them because they still can not get as much as they paid for them.  If you have equity and would like to move now might be a good time.  Interest rates are oh so low and homes are selling. 

Real estate is local. for more numbers like these except for different months please see local market conditions and home prices.

Agency and Dual Agency

An exciting topic in real estate and one that is often misunderstood by consumers who think there is an advantage in buying a home through the agent at the open house.  That agent represents the seller.  

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This post is a kind of public service message that I like to run once a year. 

Today is the day.  This applies to Minnesota, real estate is locally regulated so it may not work the same way in other  states.  There are five kinds of agency relationships in real estate recognized by the state of Minnesota:

  1. Seller’s Agent: representing and acting for the seller only. May be a listing agent, or any REALTOR® licensed to the listing broker, or a selling subagent.

  2. Subagent: a broker or salesperson who is working with a buyer, but represents the seller.

  3. Buyer’s Agent: representing and acting for the buyer only. As with a listing contract with sellers, an agreement for buyer representation must be in writing.

  4. Dual Agent: one licensee representing both the seller and the buyer as clients in one transaction, or two agents licensed to the same broker, one of whom represents the seller and one of whom represents the buyer in one transaction. This requires  full disclosure and informed consent of both parties. Dual agents have a limited role, must not advocate or negotiate for either party, and must not act to the detriment of either party.

  5. Facilitator: a real estate licensee who works for a buyer, a seller or both in a transaction but does not represent either in a fiduciary capacity as a Buyer’s Broker, Seller’s Broker or Dual Agent. Facilitators may perform services for consumers, but do not represent them. Facilitators are bound by license law and common law, but owe only the fiduciary duty of confidentiality unless other fiduciary duties are agreed to between licensee and consumer.

Buyers and sellers both like to ask if I am a buyers agent, or a sellers agent.  Some of these conversations have revealed some mis-information about dual agency.   Dual agency happens only when an agent, or the agents broker, or more than one of the brokers agents  are working on behalf of that broker and representing both parties in the same transaction.

I am both a buyers agent and a sellers agent.   I encounter situations where I am asked to play both roles in a single transaction.   I have represented both parties in a transaction but I prefer not to.   Dual agency is a bit different in than buyers agency or sellers agency in that the agent can not advocate or negotiate for either party.  Takes the fun out of it for me, and I still believe that both parties are better off if they each have their own agent.

As an agent I find that my experience as a buyers agent and as a sellers agent helps me with both roles.  When it comes to negotiating an offer no matter which side I am representing I have a clear understanding of what the other party might want, or how they might be feeling about it all. 

Real estate is about people and buying or selling property is a large and important transaction, and there are always emotions involved.  Having experience with sellers helps me advise buyers and having experience with buyers helps me advise sellers and understand how to market their home.  I can see the home through the buyers eyes, just as I can see the buyers offer from the sellers point of view.

If I were choosing an agent I would not consider it an advantage to work with an agent that is not representing both parties in the transaction.    I would consider it an advantage to have my own agent representing my best interests instead of an agent who is operating in the dual agency role and representing both parties.  Like it says above:  

“Dual agents have a limited role, must not advocate or negotiate for either party, and must not act to the detriment of either party.”

Buyers who go from open house to open house or the agent listed on each sign, to see each home,  run the risk of working with an agent in a dual role.  Get your own agent. There is still a myth out there that agents can only show their own listings.  We can show any home listed in the MLS, this is called “broker reciprocity“.  It helps sellers because all agents are working to sell their home and it helps buyers because they can work with any agent from any company to buy any piece of real estate.

Fewer sales fewer agents

 There are fewer licensed real estate agents than there were last year.  The number of agents has been going down but not as quickly as the number of home sales has gone down.  The last half of 2010 through all of 2011 were the hardest post housing crash years and it is understandable that some agents moved on. 

There are still too many agents but at least the odds are getting better.    Not all members of the Minnesota association sell real estate.  Some are in other related business, others are managers and some are part-time sales people.  I don’t have all the numbers for the state of Minnesota as far as how many pieces of real property were sold last year but I can estimate and conclude that there are still twice as many agents as there were sales.  

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Members of the Minnesota Association of Realtors

Realtor association membership is a bit complicated.  It is possible to have a real estate license and to not belong but agents who do not belong to the association can not list homes on our multiple listing service (MLS)  Most agents are members of the MN association.  We join a local association and automatically become members of the state and National Association.  I have to say out of all of those associations I belong to I  get the most value from being a member the Minnesota Association.