The number one question that REALTORS® are asked is, “How’s the market?”. There are lots of ways to answer that question, and one of the best answers is that it depends whether you’re a Buyer, a Seller or an Investor. There are other good answers as well, and one of them is that all real estate is LOCAL. You can’t read an article in a national newspaper giving statistics for the housing market across the country, because real estate is doing well (i.e., prices are increasing) in some states more than in others. Within a given state you can see some counties that are doing better, and others that are doing worse. The same is true for towns within a given county.
The 2nd quarter statistics are in, and I thought I’d share some of the Monmouth County real estate information with you. I looked at 25 towns in the Eastern part of the county. If we compare the January 1 – June 30 median sales prices of single-family homes for this year to those from 2013, Long Branch has seen the greatest price increase (15.2%) and Eatontown the greatest price decrease (-10.2%). Five of the towns that I follow had fewer than 20 home sales in one or both years, so I didn’t calculate the percentage changes for those towns because I feel those numbers wouldn’t be statistically significant.
Here’s the town by town information for the 25 Monmouth County towns I follow:
Find out what's happening in Long Branch-Eatontownfor free with the latest updates from Patch.
Sold Median Price Change
Long Branch 57 $265,000 15.2%
Wall 88 $447,500 14.8%
Little Silver 32 $617,950 12.4%
Fair Haven 50 $678,500 12.1%
Colts Neck 44 $689,850 11.6%
Rumson 48 $1,050,000 10.1%
Oceanport 27 $415,000 9.2%
Tinton Falls 44 $403,700 9.1%
Marlboro 107 $495,500 8.9%
Matawan 26 $312,500 4.2%
Hazlet 77 $285,000 3.6%
Red Bank 24 $337,500 2.3%
Manalapan 114 $456,500 1.4%
Howell 174 $307,500 0.8%
Holmdel 58 $660,750 0.3%
Middletown 241 $375,000 -1.3%
Ocean 77 $350,000 -1.4%
Aberdeen 57 $284,900 -5.0%
West Long Branch 26 $355,500 -6.0%
Eatontown 40 $279,250 -10.2%
Asbury Park 34 $251,800
Atlantic Highlands 19 $375,000
Highlands 16 $217,750
Monmouth Beach 17 $825,000
Shrewsbury 14 $535,000
Six of the towns saw the median sales price increase by more than 10%, 3 saw increases between 5% and 10%, 6 saw price increases less than 5%, 5 saw median price decreases, and the last 5 had too few sales to calculate a percentage change.
Find out what's happening in Long Branch-Eatontownfor free with the latest updates from Patch.
The bottom line is that real estate is doing very well in some towns and not in others. If you’re thinking of buying a home in Monmouth County, you’ll have to pay more than you would have a year ago in 15 towns but you’ll pay less than you would have in 5 other towns. The old adage about real estate is true: location, location, location.
Len
Leonard “Len” Dunikoski, GRI
REALTOR® Associate
Diane Turton Realtors – Rumson Office
8 West River Road
Rumson, NJ 07760
(732) 239-0739 (cell) (732) 530-6686 (office)
