The SABOR 2009 Housing Forecast was recently presented. They do it every year and hold it downtown in the fancy Omni Hotel conference room. All the bigwig Realtors and Builders give their spiel on the San Antonio Real estate market. Remember, these are Realtors painting this picture for us so take it with a grain of salt as with anything coming out of the NAR.

They stated the following in their presentation, which I have posted here on my site. Sales were down 18% in 2008 compared to 2007. Down 23% from peak in 2006. A bright note they claim is that inventory is not however growing.

This seems odd to me because as I drive around all I see are For Sale signs. Fewer sales but less homes being listed for sale with 17,359 units sold in 2008. Months of supply are up at around 8 but only due to the fewer sales. The average days on the market for 2008 was up to 87 and that number doubles when you get north outside loop 1604.

Foreclosures were up 23% compared to 2007. The median sales price stayed flat at around 155k. According to the head honcho’s San Antonio Prices are now stable and expected to stay stable through 2009.

The percentage price change per neighborhood can be found on the .pdf file presentation but most neighborhoods saw about 2% appreciation rate for 2008. There were reports in another earlier that SA was down 4% but that was comparing November 07 to November 08.

In a recent article from Yahoo titled 2009 Real Estate Forecast: Troubles Spread it states that some Texas cities could now also be in trouble like the rest of the US. It forecasts that Houston could drop 8.5% and San Antonio could see price drops of up to 10% in 2009.

The article then goes on to explain how severely damaged markets such as Boston, Orange County and our hometown San Diego could be reaching affordability levels seen before the boom and may level off. My wife ran across a thread on City-Data that asked all the California transplants how many of them would consider moving back now that homes were affordable and back down to 2001 prices. Honey, pack the bags and I’ll load up the tools in the truck!

As always, Location, Quality and Price will be key for our rehabs through the New Year.