If a picture is worth a thousand words, a graph can be worth a thousand numbers.

Where a large volume of numbers can overwhelm, a simple graph can bring things into focus very quickly.  As such, we brought out our computer graphing tools and crunched some of the numbers available for houses sold in the Boulder County area. For the sake of simplicity, we did not look at condos and townhomes. The numbers came from the Boulder Area Realtor® Association (BARA), which compiled its figures from the IRES Multiple Listing Service.

What we found was very interesting!

Looking at monthly sales and pricing figures, it becomes clear that, to date, this year has seen a significant drop in the number of homes sold.  However, the numbers also show us that area home sellers are a stubborn bunch –– at least so far. 

Though a reduction in demand would usually force prices down considerably, it appears that many Boulder County homeowners would rather hold onto their dwellings than accept significantly lower prices.  Pricing has held up pretty well in many places. On an annual basis, the worst decline in median home prices occurred in Lafayette where  year-over-year declines hit 9.7 percent this summer, according to BARA. (These are 12 month figures comparing sales between 07/01/07 and  06/30/08 to similar figures from 07/01/08 to 06/30/09.)

But, even the Lafayette decline may not be as significant as the numbers suggest since many real estate agents report that the hottest market segment is the lower end.  As first-time buyers take advantage of the $8,000 federal tax credit for home purchases and some current homeowners downsize to improve their general financial situation, competition for lower priced homes has heated up.  In other words, we may be selling more small, low priced homes, which would bring the median down even where prices on comparable homes are generally holding up.

Let's start with the number of homes sold in Boulder County (In all graphs, the red bar represents this year while the yellow, green and blue bars represent the previous three years):



One can see that the number of home sales in the county has fallen significantly this year, even when compared to 2008, which was not the best year in the last four.

A similar trend is evident in graphs for Boulder City, Louisville and Lafayette:






Pricing, however, shows more stability in all three cities.  As noted above, Lafayette has seen a year-over-year drop of 9.7 percent in median home prices. Boulder is down 2.2 percent while Louisville is off just 0.6 percent.





For the record, BARA reports a 4.5 percent rise in median prices in Erie, a 5.8 percent decline in Longmont, a 6.8 percent drop in Superior, a 1.4 percent retreat in the mountains and a seven percent decline on the plains. Broomfield County is experiencing a 6.9 percent rise in median home prices during this period.

As always, the future represents the big question mark.  Boulder area prices could remain relatively stable if the national economy picks up as predicted.  In this scenario sellers might be rewarded for their patience. Of course sellers can hold out  only so long.  If the economy continues in recession or recovers slowly and home sales remain sluggish, then sellers will come under increasing pressure and prices could drop rather quickly.  If you are a seller, keep your fingers crossed.