Missouri Real Estate

The developer of the 10th Street Lofts and Louderman Lofts in St. Louis took some time to be interviewed by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.  Here’s the interview.  In it, he notes the difficult time financing condo conversions currently and that a lot of St. Louis condo projects are stalled.  Banks just don’t want to risk it in the current credit crisis and declining real estate market.

But at the same time, he notes the strong fundamentals of the downtown area and that as more people move downtown, more retail will follow the people into St. Louis.

Callaway County real estate hasn’t seen the foreclosure boom that many areas have seen, with only 1 in ~17,000 homes facing a foreclosure filing.  Compared to the national average of 1 in 171 homes, there’s a significant difference.

But that doesn’t mean that the Callaway County real estate market hasn’t seen better days.  An examination of data from property transactions in Callaway County, Audrain County, and Cole County found that, combined, the number of homes sold n the three Missouri counties was down 35-45% from 2007.

Learn more.

Kansas City, Missouri was singled out as an interesting aspect in news coverage of the latest National Association of Realtors existing home sales report because home sales in Kansas City MO fell despite affordable home prices and solid local employment.

Learn more at RedOrbit.

HomeVestors has named St. Louis, Missouri number 8 on its list of the top 10 markets for real estate investing in the second quarter of 2008.  Nearby Kansas City, Kansas tied with Chicago for tenth place on the list.

Read more in the RISMedia article.

Southeast Missouri is faring better than the national real estate market, but the real estate downturn is still having an impact on the local housing market, according to an article in the Southeast Missourian.

According to the article, new home construction is showing a significant slowdown in Cape Girardeau and Jackson, with 50 percent declines in the number of building permits issued in the first half of the year versus last year.  Home developers are still optimistic, however, that the homes in the projects that they are continuing to pursue will sell.

Real estate agents in the Webster Groves and Kirkwood area are still upbeat about local real estate market conditions despite the media portrayal of the national housing market.

St. Louis was not as hard hit as other areas of the country (such as Florida and California), but the local market has seen a decline in the number of homes sold and shifted from a sellers’ market to a buyers’ market.  Based on personal experience, the real estate agents see home sales down 5-20 percent locally, but noted that homes priced properly given the current market conditions were still selling in a reasonable amount of time.

Read more.