What is wrong with some RE agents in town? (Tucson: real estate, broker)

[sierraAZ]

I've been following the RE news in town for quite a while. Here are some blogs I've been reading and what they have to say about the current inventory.

Tucson Real Estate In The News - Tucson Real Estate In The News - A Tucson AZ Real Estate Blog

Down from the 10,000 + active listings of last year, we are over 8,000 and could drop below that this summer.

Tucson Market Stats | The Housechick Blog

I counted 8197 active listings for May, and 907 sales, which means the number of sales are up, and the amount of inventory available is still high.

TARMLS shows a count of 7250 (they don't include most of the new construction). May should be the first month of comparing apples to apples considering up until May 2007 their reports covered much larger area, which included even Rocky Point.

On this site Paper Economy - A Real Estate Bubble Blog we have a current count of 8618.

Even Housing Tracker - HousingTracker.net: Median Home Asking Price & Inventory Data for Tucson, Arizona - shows a count of 9,587.

Then we have this strange guy Greg McCown saying

As of 6/16/08 there are 10700 Active listings and 1932 Pending on the market.

Realty Times -

I don't believe he's changed this statement of his for months. I'm really curious to know whose interests he represents. Certainly not his own... Granted, Realty Times - Real Estate News and Advice is quite a worthless site and many of these statements are way outdated, but what sense does it make for agents to work against their own interest out of plain laziness is beyond me...? I can't think of any other reason. Can you?

[michael krotchie]

You've linked to some of the better blogs.. Kelley Koehler is pretty sharp and I enjoy reading her posts also.

You get some discrepancies regarding listing/DOM/sales numbers for a couple reasons:
- some agents consider certain types of listings or designations in or out of their numbers
- some agents don't wait until TARMLS publishes their official statistics, instead running the numbers themselves on the last day of the month, or first few days afterwards (with appropriate dates)

What I will say is this: It's the first time since 2004 that we've seen listings decrease Jan-May. Although inventory is still high at least we're paring down the numbers.

While I won't defend other agents, I will say this - Many of them don't plan for tomorrow because today the fishing is good. I talked to my broker this year (when renewal fees were due) and he mentioned that nearly 1,000 agents didn't renew. Says a lot about how easy it was to hop in the market a few years ago.

[sierraAZ]

Originally Posted by michael krotchie

You've linked to some of the better blogs.. Kelley Koehler is pretty sharp and I enjoy reading her posts also.

You get some discrepancies regarding listing/DOM/sales numbers for a couple reasons:
- some agents consider certain types of listings or designations in or out of their numbers
- some agents don't wait until TARMLS publishes their official statistics, instead running the numbers themselves on the last day of the month, or first few days afterwards (with appropriate dates)

What I will say is this: It's the first time since 2004 that we've seen listings decrease Jan-May. Although inventory is still high at least we're paring down the numbers.

While I won't defend other agents, I will say this - Many of them don't plan for tomorrow because today the fishing is good. I talked to my broker this year (when renewal fees were due) and he mentioned that nearly 1,000 agents didn't renew. Says a lot about how easy it was to hop in the market a few years ago.

I just can't see how Greg's numbers can be right considering what all others show, unless he includes all new construction. And probably nobody but Strobeck knows those. To the best of my knowledge there's no count of permits anywhere online.

[michael krotchie]

Perhaps including commercial properties also? Not sure, but I'm off to hit the hay!

[sierraAZ]

Originally Posted by michael krotchie

Perhaps including commercial properties also? Not sure, but I'm off to hit the hay!

I don't think they're supposed to be included, but anyway....

Considering it's only 9:15... have fun in that hay!

[Bummer]

Hey, Sierra . . . possibly DENIAL?

[austin-steve]

You get some discrepancies regarding listing/DOM/sales numbers for a couple reasons:
- some agents consider certain types of listings or designations in or out of their numbers
- some agents don't wait until TARMLS publishes their official statistics, instead running the numbers themselves on the last day of the month, or first few days afterwards (with appropriate dates)

That's probably the reason. I'm an agent (not in Tucson) and I post a lot of stats. Mine never match the Board Published stats because I look only at single family detached homes and excluded everything else. Others include condos and duplexes in their stats. I also filter outliers when appropriate to do so.

The only time you'll see the exact same stats on any two Realtor blogs is when both are using the Board Published stats out of the box.

Steve

[sierraAZ]

Originally Posted by Bummer

Hey, Sierra . . . possibly DENIAL?

Oh, denial explains many an opinion , but in this case it simply doesn't make sense. If you are to fib, you fib in the other direction. If even housingtracker (I don't believe they have any skin in the game) shows about a 1,000 fewer properties, why would he keep saying they are more when that's certainly not in his best interest as RE agent...?

[sierraAZ]

Originally Posted by austin-steve

That's probably the reason. I'm an agent (not in Tucson) and I post a lot of stats. Mine never match the Board Published stats because I look only at single family detached homes and excluded everything else. Others include condos and duplexes in their stats. I also filter outliers when appropriate to do so.

The only time you'll see the exact same stats on any two Realtor blogs is when both are using the Board Published stats out of the box.

Steve

I know the stats on the first two blogs include condos. Not sure about duplexes as I don't think we have many of those. I ran the count on the MLS on everything in Tucson (heck, didn't even exclude land). This number may be lower because others include some outlying areas.

I understand the numbers can't be identical by any means, but to have a discrepancy of almost 2,000 is too much.

[gregmccown]

Hello, my name is Greg McCown. I have been actively posting the actual number of active listings in the Tucson MLS for about the last 6 months, updating my information every Monday. I take into account all active listings for sale in the Tucson MLS in the Tucson areas defined as Central, Northwest, West, North, Northeast, East, South, Southwest, XNE, XNW, XW, XS, and Southeast. How this makes me "strange" or somehow representing someone's "interests" I have no idea. I have been consistent with how I obtain this information. If you look at the MLS right now, it says there are 10655 active listings and 1837 under contract using that criteria. I can also give you the actual numbers for the last several Mondays if you like.