January 15, 2025 Cromford Report Update

January 15, 2025 Cromford Report Update

January 15, 2025, brings a mix of news and insights for both buyers and sellers in the real estate market. As we kick off the new year, it's crucial to stay informed about the latest trends and data that could influence your real estate decisions.

Each month about this time we look back at the previous month, analyze how pricing has behaved and report on how well our forecasting techniques performed. We also give a forecast for how pricing will move over the next month.

For the monthly period ending January 15, we are currently recording a sales $/SF of $304.67 averaged for all areas and types across the ARMLS database. This is up 1.1% from the $301.41 we now measure for December 15. Our forecast range mid-point was $308.26. We correctly forecast a rise, but the size of the increase was smaller than we anticipated - 1.1% rather than the 2.1% we estimated. The actual result was well within the 90% confidence interval. 

The last 7 months have been extremely volatile for price per sq. ft. - up nearly 5% one month and down 3% next. The median sales prices have been much more stable since the high-end of the market has little to no effect on medians. The monthly median sales price has barely changed from $450,000 since mid October.

On January 15 the pending listings for all areas & types show an average list $/SF of $344.49, up 1.2% from the reading for December 15. This suggests that closed prices will strengthen again between now and mid-February. Among those pending listings we have 98.4% normal, 0.4% in REOs and 1.1% in pre-foreclosures (including a very small number of short sales). The level of foreclosure activity has picked up a little although it remains very low by long-term standards. 

Our mid-point forecast for the average monthly sales $/SF on February 15 is $308.36, which is up 1.2% from the January 15 reading. We have a 90% confidence that it will fall within ± 2% of this mid point, i.e. in the range $302.19 to $314.53.

Supply is now growing fast and demand remains subdued, so we do not expect to see the median sales price increase very much, even if the average sales price per square foot grows as anticipated.

The Cromford Report analyzes Maricopa County Arizona real estate data.