Wow – what a year! The real estate market in 2018 saw nearly 500 transactions totaling $934 million in dollar volume*. To put that in perspective, compare it to last year, where 436 sales produced $676 million in sales volume. So, from 2017 to 2018, the number of real estate sales increased by 13% but the total dollar volume increased by 38%. So what does that tell us? Not only did more transactions occur, but they occurred a much higher prices. Another way to look at the trend is through the overall average sales price, which increased from $1,550,000 in 2017 to nearly $1,900,000 in 2018, an increase of 22%!

In comparing sale transactions quarter by quarter, 2018 outperformed 2017 in each quarter. Regarding sales volume, while 2018 started out slowly with slightly less volume than Q1 2017, the remainder of the year made up for it, especially in the second quarter when 2018 sales volume was double that of 2017.

So, in what price points did the additional sales occur in 2018? The majority (40%) of sales occurred in the $500,000 – $1 million range (the “local’s market”), a similar share seen in 2017. Sales in the $1-3 million range also grew at consistent levels, representing 35% of the all 2018 sales. The big shift in 2018, was a 47% decrease in sales under $500,000 (47 sales in 2018 vs. 69 in 2017) AND a significant increase in sales over $3 million. In 2018, there were 76 sales in excess of $3 million, representing 15% of all market sales. Compare that to 2017, when 41 sales occurred in this price range (and represented only 9% of all market sales).

*Note: All statistics are pulled from Teton Board of Realtors Multiple Listing Service for residential sales/listings in Teton County, WY for 2018. It is estimated that sales outside of MLS account for an additional 20% of transactions/volume. Contact Katie for more details.

After two years of declining or stable inventory, total new listings were up slightly in 2018. Despite the increase in listings this past year, inventory levels are still low compared to levels seen in 2015-2016. The timing of new listings to market was similar between 2017 and 2018, with the majority of new listings coming hitting the market in the second quarter (April/May/June), typically popular months for new listings. However, there was a surge of new listings in the 4^th quarter in 2018, when 108 new properties came onto the market (vs. 79 in Q4 2017).

The 632 new properties that hit the market in 2018 totaled over $1.6 billion in dollar volume. The 3% increase in new listings spurred a 18.5% increase in overall listing volume. What does that tell us? Slightly more inventory was coming onto the market in 2018, but at much higher prices, as illustrated by a 15% increase in the average listing price in 2018. When comparing quarter by quarter, the average listing price was actually similar to 2017, with the exception of Q3 2018, when the average list price was $1 million higher than Q3 2017.