Economy slows Muskogee home sales

Expert: Homes staying on market 20 percent longer

By Cathy Spaulding

With new flowers and shrubs bordering a cozy front porch with huge, flat stones embedded in the patio, Paula and Matt Price’s three-bedroom house definitely has “curb appeal,” not to mention a prime location in the Grandview area.

Yet, the Prices haven’t been able to sell their home since January, partly because potential buyers have offered less than what it’s worth.

“People want it for nothing,” Paula Price said.

The Prices are not the only Muskogee homeowners waiting for their homes to sell. Real estate agent Shawn Raper, who keeps housing figures for the Muskogee Association of Realtors, said homes are staying on the market 20 percent longer this year than for the same periods in 2008. He said homes in Muskogee and Fort Gibson were on the market an average of 107 days for the second quarter of 2009, compared with 85 for second quarter of 2008. The average home was on the market for 112 days, first quarter 2009, compared with 93 first quarter of 2008, he said.

Area home sales also are down from previous periods and previous years, according to the Oklahoma Association of Realtors. The state association said Muskogee figures are in line with the rest of Oklahoma.

Meanwhile, homes in Muskogee, as in other parts of Oklahoma, are holding their values far better than those in other parts of the United States, national real-estate figures indicate.

“We had a fairly typical first quarter of the year,” Raper said. “In the first quarter, the number of houses selling was down 22 percent, we had 89 closings, compared with 115 for the same time in 2008. The average price was down almost 12 percent. We’re up the number of days on the market. The second quarter is shaping up better.”

Different agents have their own outlooks on the housing market.

Muskogee RE/MAX associate Linda Sizemore said 2008 was a great year for her. Sizemore was Oklahoma’s top individual agent for RE/MAX in 2008, according to the RE/MAX Mid-States and Dixie Regional Office.

“The market in March and the first part of April 2009 was pretty slow,” said Sherri Jones, broker and owner of Prospector’s Real Estate. “After April 15, interest in houses picked up.”

One reason for the second-quarter improvement was news of the $8,000 tax benefit for first-time buyers.

Different agents have their own high and low periods, said Jones, who is listing the Price’s house. “I may be selling slowly, but someone else might be doing better, or the other way around.”

Another pair of Jones’ clients, Dustin and Amanda Martin, sold their Gooseneck Bend house within two months.

“It went pretty fast,” Amanda Martin said. “Sherri worked hard to sell the house.”

Martin said she and her husband spent a long time looking for a new house before they found one just off York Street.

“We were in luck,” she said. “The house we purchased was going to go on the market that very day.”

But Jones said she also had down times.

“I was getting an offer three weeks ago, then the person walked in and said, ‘They’re closing the plant in a month,’” she said.

Another client pulled out of a sale after losing a job, she said.

“That’s happened more in the last couple of years,” she said. “People are scared to do anything.”

Jones said the Price’s home has been on the market longer than the average home on that area. But it’s not for lack of work.

“They’ve had three offers, but they’ve been low-balls,” Jones said. “(Buyers) think people are desperate to sell. But these people aren’t as desperate as people think they are. They (buyers) just see what’s on TV and think people are desperate to sell.”

Jones said the Prices are getting offers at 10 percent less than their asking price of $108,000.

Paula Price said they are not desperate to sell and are standing firm on their price.

“We got married, he had a house here and I had a house in Phoenix Village,” she said. The couple moved to the Phoenix Village house but left some furniture in the Grandview home to help it sell.

Plummeting home values in other parts of the United States have not hit Oklahoma and surrounding states.

Figures from the National Association of Realtors show that the median price of a home in Oklahoma City was $129,900 for first quarter of 2009, up 4 percent from the same time in 2008. The median price for a home in Phoenix/Mesa/Scottsdale, Ariz., fell 41.9 percent to $129,200; Fort Myers/Cape Coral, Fla., fell 59.1 percent to $87,300 those same periods.

A median price is when half of all homes in an area sell for more and half sell for less. An average price is determined by totaling home prices in an area and dividing by the number of homes sold.

“I see a lot of people from out west come out here, and they are caught by surprise at the cost of housing,” she said. “This house would cost a million dollars in California. But salaries aren’t as big as they are in California.”

Jones said there are no parts of town that are selling better or worse than others.

However, homes lower than $100,000 are selling much better than higher priced homes — if people can find them, Raper said. “In my opinion, there is a shortage of mid-range homes, between $60,000 and $100,000,” he said. “There is a fairly pent-up demand in that price range, but a lack of listings at that price.”

These would be homes such as those found in the Grandview and Phoenix Village areas or neighborhoods near Grant Foreman and Tony Goetz Elementary Schools, he agreed.

Raper said he supposed fewer people are moving up to the higher price range and are keeping their mid-range houses.

“In particular, homes above $100,000 are not selling,” he said.

Jones said fewer buyers are looking in the $125,000 to $150,000 range.

“People are buying smarter to me,” she said. “They are buying on the dollar instead of extending themselves.”

Jones said Muskogee has a lot of people on low income, and tighter credit standards are making it harder to buy, but not impossible. She said people with bad credit can get help overcoming their low scores, but it takes time.

“If someone has a score of 580, lenders can help them over the year to increase it, work on their credit. I have a lot of clients who do that,” she said.

Muskogee experienced a boom in existing home sales in 2006, with 909 sold that year, including 225 of that sold in the first quarter.

In 2008, 751 homes sold in Muskogee, the lowest number of sales since 2004, when 754 homes were sold, according to the Oklahoma Association of Realtors.

However, the average price of a home sold in Muskogee has risen since 2004, from $77,819 to $90,265 in 2008.



Muskogee housing sales

Existing home sales and average price per home, per year

• 2008 — 751, $90,265.

• 2007 — 770, $88,595.

• 2006 — 904, $81,238.

• 2005 — 858, $79,758.

• 2004 — 754, $77,819.

First quarter home sales, per year

• 2009 — 130.

• 2008 — 166.

• 2007 — 165.

• 2006 — 225.

• 2005 — 151.

Source: Oklahoma Association

of Realtors



Reach Cathy Spaulding at 918-684-2928 or Click Here to Send Email

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