Wellesley's Real Estate Market Is Piping-Hot

It’s hot, hot, hot. And no, it’s certainly not the weather we’re talking about --- it’s the Wellesley real estate market, where houses are going under agreement the very same day they’re listed. It’s certainly a turnaround from a year ago when the market was sluggish, and houses sat for months or were simply never sold.

Case in point for this spring’s piping-hot sellers’ market is 7 Hill Top Road, a stone’s throw from Linden Square. According to Wellesley’s Board of Assessors’ on-line property record cards, the house and its land is currently assessed at $640,000. Listed in April for $829,000, 7 Hill Top ended up selling for much, much more than the asking price. In fact, 7 Hill Top’s listing agent Prue Hay of Rutledge Properties had never encountered such a huge difference, percentage-wise, between asking and selling price. And there were even multiple offers.

Notes Ms. Hay: “The speed is what surprised me:  Brokers got their customers into the house, and they submitted offers right away with no hesitation. It was a very charming house with interesting architectural details.” If a house is priced right, she continued: “It’s almost a frenzy out there.” She also had a similar experience with 19 Southgate, which was listed for $1,219,000 and also went for over that price.

Another home that immediately went under agreement with a substantially higher-than-asking price offer was 19 Abbott Street, listed by Elaine Bannigan of Pinnacle Residential Properties for $649,900. A true fixer-upper in a desirable town center location, the home has 3 bedrooms and 2 baths on just a postage stamp of land.

In stark contrast, 8 Abbott, a house just down the street that’s almost two-thirds larger than 19 Abbott, languished on the market for a couple of years, first listed by Prudential Town and Country Real Estate and then by the owner, before being sold last year for $25,000 less than the $800,000 asking price.

Only time will tell if this hot market will last into the dog days of summer, but for now, with appealing interest rates (they’re currently hovering around 3.5% for a 30-year fixed mortgage), people are eager to pull out their checkbooks and buy.