Buyers keep up pressure for lower home prices

REAL ESTATE

With so many home-owners impatient to sell their property, potential buyers are faced with a tricky but fortunate question: Exactly how low can they go on the bid price and still be taken seriously?

Data from the Charleston Trident Association of Realtors shows buyers are getting homeowners to come down further off their listing price compared to recent years.

So far this year, the average home buyer has gotten sellers to reduce their sale price to 94 percent of the listing price. That's 1 percent lower than last year's figure, and represents a list-price-versus-sale-price gap greater than the historical norm.

As you might have guessed, 2005 was not a year for hardball negotiating. At the peak of the market, buyers were lucky to be able to walk through a house before it attracted other bids, much less have a shot at exclusive interest and a negotiating position on the property. Correspondingly, the association's data shows that homes sold in 2005 across Charleston for a stiff 97 percent of the list price.

Numbers from the second quarter of this year show that buyers in certain Charleston neighborhoods have more leverage than in others.

Sale prices remained relatively close to the asking price — staying within 96 percent to 97 percent — in areas such as North Charleston, Hanahan, Summerville, James Island, West Ashley and Mount Pleasant. That discount still amounts to a respectable $6,000 to $8,000 off for the average $200,000 Charleston-area home.

Buyers had more luck on Daniel Island, where they were able to talk down the price to an average of 92 percent of the listing price, while Johns Island buyers negotiated down to 95 percent.

Homes in the luxury island markets were priced with much more leeway, with the average buyer paying 92 percent on Folly Beach, 91 percent on Sullivan's Island and 93 percent on Isle of Palms. Properties on peninsular Charleston typically sold for 94 percent of the list price.

These statistics come with a major disclaimer: They take into account only the list price at the time of the sale. So if that three-bedroom Park West townhouse in Mount Pleasant went on the market at $325,000 and saw its price cut incrementally to $250,000, finally hooking a buyer willing to pay $235,000, then the ratio to list price for that home would be 94 percent, not 72 percent.

Merging forces

A small boutique real estate firm has shed its independence to join Carolina One Real Estate.

Christina Ellis & Associates of Mount Pleasant will now work out of the larger company's Goose Creek office. The firm handles residential and commercial transactions throughout the area, focusing especially on north-area sales.

Ellis said the merger was in their clients' best interest, since the firm now will have access to better resources. The firm has six agents.

Congrats!

John Bourne Jr. has been honored with the title of Commercial Realtor of the Year, an award given out through the Charleston Trident Association of Realtors.

The association said in a press release that the former North Charleston mayor and longtime real estate agent has been "a constant advocate for private property rights" and helped the region grow responsibly.

Bourne joined the association in 1950.