Aspen: Colorado
Although the Aspen real estate market has stabilized, and the inventory of properties for sale in the first half of 2013 is down 11 percent over the same time last year and down 31 percent since the first half of 2009, inventory continues to be comparatively high.
Current inventory is 68 percent higher, and property sales are 32 percent less, than what they were in the first half of 2004 (the beginning of the 2000’s market climb), according to the Estin Report.
The Aspen real-estate market has certainly improved since the dark days of the recession, but not on an upward trajectory as expected In the first half of 2013, the number of units or properties sold was up by 28 percent over the same time last year — 201 versus 157 — yet dollar sales volume was down by 16 percent: $401 million this year compared to $479 million last year.
So far, this year has seen a wave of lower-end sales, especially single-family homes priced under $2 million and condos under $1 million, both selling at discounts relative to the peak market prices of five years ago. Aspen’s average prices per-square-foot have stabilized near first-half 2006 levels at $1,026 per square feet for single-family homes and $927 per square feet for condos.
Aspen and Vail lag behind other high-profile luxury markets such as the Hamptons, Martha’s Vineyard, Nantucket, and the West Coast, mostly weekend and second-home markets.
“Historically, Aspen has been last-in, first-out of recessions, but it feels more like Aspen is last out this time,” said Estin.
Still, the past nine months have experienced the greatest fluctuation in Aspen real estate dollar sales in the nearly five years since the crisis began. Estin says to call it the carryover effect: the unprecedented strength of December 2012 sales, motivated by tax and capital gains changes for 2013, may be largely responsible for a lackluster first half of 2013.
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