The Scottsdale housing market

The Scottsdale housing market, part of the Phoenix area real estate market, improvement in the most recent tracking periods. According to a May 22, 2010 article in the Arizona Republic, April figures for existing-home sales in metro Phoenix reveal several promising shifts for those searching for signs of a housing market recovery. The overall number of home sales in the region continued to hover near record levels last month. The piece, composed by Catherine Reagor, went on to state that Beneath the sales figures were other encouraging numbers: Foreclosures did not dominate sales of existing homes in the Valley for the first time in more than a year. The number of investors purchasing homes from lenders dropped. More buyers purchased homes with the intent of living on them. More buyers financed their purchases with long-term mortgages. April sales included the last wave of first-time buyers who rushed to buy before a federal tax credit expired.

The increased rate of purchase for Scottsdale real estate was reflected in a higher demand for housing land. According to a June 13, 2010 article from the Arizona Republic, Homebuilders are buying land again in metropolitan Phoenix. So far this year, according to the Arizona brokerage firm Land Advisors, homebuilders here have spent $90 million on land purchases for new homes. Thats the most builders have invested in the regions land in any year since the peak of the housing boom in 2006. The piece, also written by Catherine Reagor, also reported that New land purchases are a sign the cycle is stirring to life again in a retooled housing industry. The parcels of land and the pool of builders buying them are both much smaller than before the real-estate crash. But residential lot prices are climbing as a steady stream of purchases by builders the past six months restarts the regions new-home industry.

The number of foreclosures in the Scottsdale housing market as well as the rest of the Phoenix area has been declining steadily. According to a report from Arizona State University, Foreclosures as a share of the overall Phoenix-area resale-housing market activity are declining. The latest Realty Studies report from the W.P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University explains the number of foreclosure has gone down from 40 percent of the markets recorded activity in March to 33 percent in May.