Mid-Atlantic Inventory Level Follows National Trend (Continued Shrinkage)

In the interest of saving keystrokes, we'll go ahead and quote directly from NAR's Economists' Outlook post regarding national inventory trends... 

"The total homes listed for sale continue to move downward.  The latest decline in October to 3.33 million was partly seasonal, as autumn and winter months nearly always have fewer listings in comparison with spring and summer months.  Still, examining listings only in the month of October (so as to get an apple-to-apple comparison), this year saw the lowest inventory since 2005."

Lawrence Yun - Chief Economist, NAR

Click here to see national inventory trends for October going back to 2001. Here's a chart listing the existing home inventory levels for the MRIS footprint, Baltimore Metro, and DC Metro regions.  Refer to Mr. Yun's summary above when looking at our local chart below...

Mr. Yun is careful to point out that the inventory conditions are still considered elevated compared to the early years of the last decade. We agree. DC Metro's Oct-2011 inventory level is 63.3% higher than 10 years ago, Baltimore Metro 58.7% higher and MRIS-wide is up 59.9%. So the market still has a ways to go, but it certainly appears to be headed in the right direction to get more balance between supply and demand.