I specialize in the Lake Naomi/ Timber Trails communities here in Pocono Pines and these are predominately second home developments. I would say the average turnaround time is around 10 years. Clearly this is very individually based but it's usually because they don't get to use their homes as often or they would like to upgrade to a larger home or one that is more preferentialy located (ie. Lakefront property).
Our selling season does tend to slow over the winter months because most families want to take advantage of winter activities but buyers still come looking around that time. If you have any other questions feel free to contact me at (570)242-9681.
Thank you,
Justin Higgins/Carolyn Barcia

On a slightly off-subject to the original question, I recently compared prices between old and new houses in Pocono Pines. Old houses are in the 90 to 100-year old range. New houses are in the 5 to 15-year old range. A standard family home of 3 bedrooms and 2 baths for an old house is only 30 to 40,000 less than a new house of comparable class.
Which house should I choose ? I expect old houses to cost much less than a comparable new house, say 60 to 70,000.
It seems to me that it is much smarter to buy a new house than an old house. Am I right ?
Thanks again for all the tremendously helpful info.

James - some of the areas in Pocono Pines do not permit signs; for example, Lake Naomi and Timber Trails. Pocono Pines is just like any area across America and typically fall under the national stats of a turnover every 5 - 7 years. Especially with vacation homes, families often find the usage becomes limited as their children grow and get invovled in other activities. So we often see a reason for selling is the lack of use after time. Winter is a popular time in the Pocono Pines area because you can reach any of the three major ski areas in a matter of minutes. Although there is less sales activity, there are sales that occur during the winter months.

The turn-over rate that I referred to, referred to the average length of time that an owner keeps the house before he resells it on the market again.
I did not refer to the length of time that it takes to sell a house, even though the information was very helpful.
I drove around in Pocono Pines, and saw lots of old houses. It seems that the owners just keep the houses forever, transferring from generation to generation, without selling the houses.
That is why I said I did not see too many houses for sale in Pocono Pines.

Many local agents have MLS / IDX searches on their websites, which should give the most accurate count of the current inventory because it is linked directly to the local Multiple Listing Service. Please visit my site for an example of this.

Thank you very much for your replies.
I did a search here on this website and found only 78 homes for sale vs 136, as stated in one answer.
Should I use another website like realtordotcom to search for houses ?
Which web site is the most comprehensive ?
I know there are a number of websites out there.
I have only a limited time.
Thanks again

James - There are many factors that affect a homes speed of sale. The turnover of a home depends on pricing and exposure. Right now a homes must be competivily priced for a smart buyer to consider it. Next consider the time of year because hsitorically, (without consideration of the economic downturn) the market in the Pocono Pines area slows down until late January.

In general, the absorbtion rate in the Tobyhanna Township market is 17 months. To price a property correctly it would have to be in the lower 50% of the price range for similar properties in order for it to sell in the next 12-17 months. To sell in the next 6 months it would have to be priced in the lower 25% of the competition.

There are always homes in Pocono Pines available, because there are a few large communities there and turnover is in the normal range. There are lots of different sources of information out there on the internet, and some of them may be more reliable and accurate than others. I just did a quick search in the MLS (the real estate agent database where we share our listings) and found that there are 136 residential home listings for sale, ranging in price from $54,900 to $2.25 million. If you would like a customized search portal set up for you so you can analyze the market, email me at info@lisasanderson.com with some basic criteria you'd like in your search.