We’ve been banging away with our lone voice in the digital world these many months telling any and all that as of a couple of months ago we have seen life in the Las Vegas real estate market – hold off on the cardiac treatment the patient is alive, well and not at death’s door……
First the data, in a number of key markets in the US, via it’s latest quarterly summary the National Association of Realtors report that home sales in were up year to year 26% on average for all states and 35% of metropolitan statistical areas including Las Vegas real estate.
First American CoreLogic, which tracks property values in thousands of Zip codes and neighborhoods – reports that nominal price drops have “stabilized” in 883 core-based statistical areas, showing no declines in the past two months – this is huge, as it indicates the housing market is flattening out on a national basis, which is the first step to recovery and the market’s “finding a bottom.”
Let’s talk practicality – we have a German film crew in our office today filming our Las Vegas Foreclosure Bus Tour, which will be featured on a national broadcast in Germany later this month. The Europeans are coming – take a five minute stroll through our airport and we wager (sorry, its Las Vegas folks) you will hear 2-3 languages within this short amount of time.
Or, stroll down 5th Avenue in NY and hit the Tumi luggage store and watch the number of new suitcases and briefcases flying out of the door in the arms of Europeans – some of those Italian handmade briefcases are going home with real estate titles in them!
In the last week and a half we’ve had two large investment groups, including a multinational Hedge Fund and a large investor tour group meet with us to discuss buying large blocks of houses. In fact, we are starting to get preconditioned standing orders from some Las Vegas real estate investors telling us what they want to buy.
What does all this mean? We can’t be sure; but, we think when you look hard at the statistics and then at the increase in buy side clients we are seeing a Las Vegas real estate market in recovery. Yes, to a certain extent it’s a contrarian viewpoint but one we believe in nevertheless!!!
