A 10 Rating For The Poltrock Team in Murphy, NC

After 2 failed attempts to sell my property with other Realtors in the Murphy NC area, I decided to try one last time and went with John Poltrock for the third attempt.  Besides selling my property, I found John to give good advice and take care of me. He has a realistic understanding of what is and what is not in relation to the real estate market. He responded to or acknowledged ALL my emails. My overall experience was pleasant to the point of being enjoyable. I must say after having almost given up, I’m glad I found the best in the business!

~Bob Rasche, Saranac, MI

The Poltrock Team – REMAX Mountain Properties – Murphy NC – www.MyMurphy.com– Call us Toll Free at 1-866-Murphy-NC or 1-866-687-7496 – Murphy’s #1 Real Estate Team

 

 

Murphy NC’s SOLD Real Estate Market Update for Third Quarter 2014

Happy Fall from the mountains of Murphy, North Carolina! The leaves are now showing off their brilliant colors and marks an excellent time for folks to come to the mountains, both for leisure and to buy real estate! If you’re not already here and want to enjoy the Fall colors, I recommend you arrive to the mountains soon as the colors look like they will change quite quickly. This would be a great weekend to come! The picture below is one I took Tuesday for you to enjoy 🙂 It’s a panorama, so may want to make your screen as large as possible.

Mountain Picture

SOLD REAL ESTATE UPDATE

So far, this year’s real estate sales have been wonderful and sporadic. We have seen some of the best months we have seen in many years and while some fell to 2011 records. Despite mixed results, this year has continued to show incredible stability in one of the most important parts to sellers – pricing. We have not noticed any major indicators pointing toward lower prices for about a year and a half. On the flip side, we have not noticed any rising prices as of yet either. This is a strong positive considering the rapidly declining prices we have seen in years past. It takes stability first to have rising prices!

RE/MAX Has 44% Market Share in Cherokee County

Here are some useful facts about our current HOUSING market:

  • Both August and September yielded higher monthly volume than the past 5 years
  • Total house sales volume is down 10.3% (2013 sold 321 to end of Q3 and 2013 sold 288)
  • The Absorption Rate of Homes is steadily improving. We’re at a 12.9 month supply of homes – an incredible improvement! In 2008, we had reached an astonishing 54 month supply of homes! The lower this number is, the better for sellers.
  • There are 620 homes currently for sale in Cherokee County.
  • List to Sell Ratio continues to hold steady at 93%. That means sellers take an average of 93% of their asking price. The lowest we saw was 84%. The higher this number is, the better for sellers.
  • An average of 45 homes sold each month in the third quarter! That’s incredibly strong – especially if you look at the attached Monthly Volume, you’ll see what I mean!
  • Days on Market – aka. time for a home to sell – is continuing to improve! Last month it took an average of 188 days to sell a home. 209 days is the annual average which is one full month faster than past!

CLICK HERE to Join our SOLD UPDATE! Here you will see a link to see all the SOLD homes, land, and commercial property. Pictures, prices, sold dates, and more!

Here are some useful facts about our current LAND market:

  • Land sales volumes continue to hold steady – low teens is the average monthly volume consistently and has been for several years now.
  • Large tract acreage prices tends to average $2,000-3,000
  • List to Sell Ratio has averaged 81-85% for this year
  • There is a 73 month supply of land available for sale
  • There are 977 Parcels of land for sale in Cherokee County

The next 45 days on the market are crucial. We’re able to capitalize on some of the busiest time of the year. Make sure you’re prepared for it and making the most of the activity we’re going to have moving forward.

Looking to the future, we can expect sales are going to continue to be great. We’ll see seasonality kick in and sales drop off once we get to about 2 weeks before Christmas. Once that hits, we’ll have a lull of approximately 30 days. We’ll then see buyers begin to come back into the marketplace yielding a great February and March. It’s contrary to many folk’s popular belief, but it is the case. In today’s world of communication, buyers are still able to search and find the property they’ve been dreaming of no matter the weather or time of year. If you’re thinking, “nothing’s going to happen in the winter,” you can be very wrong.

And if you’re a subscriber, you’ll also be able to get our market statistics included! Join on the link above to see Cherokee County’s Market Absorption Report, Average Market Price, Monthly, Volume, and more!

We thank you for the opportunity to serve you and work for you. Any time you need us, we’re no more than a phone call away. Give us a call and let us know what we can do to help! We’re here for you.

Call The Poltrock Team – REMAX of Murphy NC – www.MyMurphy.com – JohnPoltrock@gmail.com – Call us Toll Free at 1-866-Murphy-NC or 1-866-687-7496 – Murphy’s #1 Real Estate Team

Thanks for Getting our Land SOLD in Murphy NC!

John,

Thank you for getting our land sold for us! Your hard work made everything run so smoothly that we didn’t even need to be there or come up, even for the closing! You were very confident in handling the transaction for us and informing us what was going on with the real estate market and on the status of our deal. I wish we had more property to sell with you because we would certainly use you and your wonderful wife again!

Mike and Valinda Hodge
Sebring, FL

The Poltrock Team at REMAX Mountain Properties– www.MyMurphy.comJohnPoltrock@gmail.com – Call us Toll Free Today at 1-866-Murphy-NC or 1-866-687-7496 – Skype: johnpoltrock – Murphy’s #1 Real Estate Team

Early April Murphy NC Real Estate Market Update

Good afternoon! If you’re not in Murphy right now, you’re missing out on TONS of rain! It’s coming down by the bucket full!

March proved itself by being a great real estate month! 25 homes sold in March – surpassing every month so far this year. There’s lots of activity on the ground and lots of agents are showing. Many of our properties have been getting a great level of showings and we have quite a few of them under contract. The market has 44 homes pending sale – many of which will close this April.

I just finished publishing our Exclusive Market Absorption Report, and to get your copy, you have to be a subscriber to our Murphy NC Real Estate Update! Email me now to join! You can see trends, pricing tiers, and activity on each. Months supply indicates how many months it will take to sell the current inventory at the current selling volume. Generally, anything less than 12 months indicates a seller’s market and anything greater than 12 months is a buyer’s market.

You must be a subscriber of The POLTROCK TEAM’s
Murphy NC Bi-Weekly Real Estate Update to get the Link to
the sold properties for March 2010.
See sold prices, pictures, and descriptions of what’s sold!
Email John at JohnPoltrock@gmail.com and join our SOLD Update for Free!

We’re finding this to be a great time to sell – believe it or not! There’s been more activity this year – and we are surpassing 2008 & 2009’s second quarter results already! 2008 averaged only 18 homes per month and 2009 average 21 homes per quarter – that’s a 19% improved over ’09 and a staggering 39% improvement over 2008! Buyer confidence is up and people are itching to buy!

There are still a lot of foreclosures in the process that are “shadow inventory” which are scheduled to come on the market in the future. Foreclosures, short sales, and other economical drivers are pushing prices down as illustrated below:

Average Selling Price

  • Q1 2009 – $165,888
  • Q2 2009 – $157,442
  • Q3 2009 – $161,964
  • Q4 2009 – $147,195
  • Q1 2010 – $132,809

Likely over this year, we will continue to see a slight decline in prices unless volume of transactions increases tremendously, which is possible! I’m finding in many cases its far better to go ahead and sell properties while they are worth more. Land especially falls in this category with almost 2000 parcels of land for sale, we have a 400 month supply or a 33 YEAR SUPPLY of land for sale! Prices have no where to go with land but down. The large majority of those are lots, which are the most affected.

With that said, we’re working hard for you! We’re having a great year with tremendous buyer interest. We appreciate the opportunity to work for you and do so tirelessly. If there’s anything we can do to help you, get your property sold, or if you know someone looking to buy and find a great deal, let us know. THANK YOU and we hope you have a great Spring!

Looking for one of those great deals to buy or sell your property and get the most you can? Contact The Poltrock Team Today!

John Poltrock – The Poltrock Team – RE/MAX Mountain Properties in Murphy NC – www.MyMurphy.com – Call Toll Free 1-866-Murphy-NC or 1-866-687-7496 – JohnPoltrock@gmail.com

September – Best Month for Real Estate Sales in Murphy NC

Wow! It’s hard to believe that it’s October already! There are so many things going on in the world of real estate right now – which is great! It seems like it’s been forever since the last Bi-Weekly update. Since we began this column in Murphy’s newspaper – The Cherokee Scout – it threw a curve ball in the “release” of our update. We’re working on getting that in sync now, so please pardon the delay.

October brings several wonderful things! Be sure to remember The RE/MAX Client Appreciation Picnic is next Saturday from 4-8! BE SURE TO COME!!! If you think you can make it and haven’t confirmed already, please let us know – we’d love to have you!
 
Fall appears as its going to be early this year, so be sure to enjoy while its here!
 september
On to real estate! September was a tremendous month. It proved to be the best September in the past 3 years. An astounding 63 properties sold in a one month period – and by anyones calculations – two per day is phenomenal! Also not reflected in these sold properties, United Community Bank (UCB) did an online auction that yielded quite a few sold properties – lots sold from a mere $2,000 to $8,000 in several instances.
 

You must be a subscriber of The POLTROCK TEAM’s
Bi-Weekly Real Estate Update to get the Link to
the sold properties for the past 14 Days.
See sold prices, pictures, and descriptions of what’s sold!
Email John at JohnPoltrock@gmail.com and join our SOLD Update!

 

 
SOLD Home Statistics in Murphy NC for September
(40 listings)
  Low High Average Median Total
List Price $40,000 $299,900 $172,424 $165,000 $6,896,950
Selling Price $40,000 $300,000 $152,836 $143,500 $6,113,432
List/Sold(%) 59.93% 100.09% 88.44% 89.78%
Price/SqFt ($) $0.00 $146.34 $43.22 $0.00
Days on Market 16 701 233 175
 
 
SOLD Land in Murphy NC Statistics
(23 listings)
  Low High Average Median Total
List Price $12,500 $215,000 $60,691 $39,900 $1,395,900
Selling Price $10,000 $185,000 $51,447 $29,100 $1,183,270
List/Sold(%) 37.93% 209.80% 83.63% 81.08%
Days on Market 113 648 301 190
 
Note the interesting phenomena on the lowest SOLD percentage of list price – Land reached as low as 38% of list and homes as low as 60% indicating some steep discounts (or high overpricing) on homes sold. There’s a direct relation between over pricing a home in today’s market and an extreme high time on market. In fact, the high time on market was an astonishing 701 days! If you don’t want to have an extended time on market like this, ensuring your home is priced competitively in the market is of the utmost importance. If you want a review of your property to see if any adjustments are necessary, give us a call or email and we’ll do the work for you.
We have seen a lot of offers thrown out there – in fact The Poltrock Team alone closed 13 transaction sides in September. We’re still seeing some of the Offers to Purchase come in extremely low and did not fly – we had offers as low as 33% of listing price. This was what I call a “Vulture” offer – folks offering ridiculous offers to see what they could get away with. Even with this happening, most of our buyers realize value even today, and that is perfectly indicative of the market. In fact the highest list to sell ratio was 100.09% of asking price – this means someone paid slightly more than asking price to ensure they bought the property.
 
Real estate is currently on the rise! Keep your fingers crossed and say your prayers for consumer confidence to continue to rise and for people to buy homes and land in the mountains of Murphy, NC!
 
As always, we thank you for the opportunity to work for you. We work hard every day and work 60+ hours per week for our clients and would love to work for you and your real estate referrals.
 
If you have any questions or anything we can do for you, please CONTACT US! Thank you for your business and trust. If you know of anyone looking to buy or sell real estate anywhere in the United States, please give us their name and number and we will take care of them to make certain they get the best service no matter where they are.
Written By: John Poltrock, Certified Residential Specialist – www.MyMurphy.com – The POLTROCK TEAM at REMAX Mountain Properties – Murphy’s #1 Real Estate Team – Contact us Today Toll Free 1-866-687-7496
 
Read previous editions of our Murphy NC Real Estate Market Update and Report.

Sold Real Estate Market Update for Murphy NC – Homes and Land

This month’s real estate update should be rather enlightening, especially since we are applying new approach to tracking the market. We hope that in addition to traditional statistics, this method will help us identify trends and find “holes” in the markets. To top it off, we’ve been working to have our Bi-Weekly Update published in the Cherokee Scout, Murphy’s leading newspaper. We hope to have this edition published in next week’s paper, so keep an eye out for it!

             The real estate market here in Murphy NC has been showing some strong underlying fundamentals while some elements many people consider “important” have declined. Here’s what that means: most people look to prices and volume of real estate to determine how strong a market is. While both are very important elements, others are equally important and never discussed. When the market began to shift, one of the key indicators it was happening were the Days on Market. Days on market for homes has evidently peaked out spiking as high as 309 days this year alone. Those have been trending downward significantly and have entered the 100 day range several times this year – in fact, this past month’s average has been a mere 177 days to sell a home.

            Volume has been holding steady with first quarter average sales being 17 sales per month and second quarter bringing 21 per month. During this third quarter, we’re currently at 19 sales per month, so the market is continuing to hold ground on volume. This is a great sign! It indicates we’re leveling off and buyers are continuing to hold faith – and they should!

            Price is often one of the most important issues people deal with in the real estate market. Although very important to buyers and sellers alike, it is not a key issue statistically as supply and demand reign supreme and ultimately determines the price of a home. It is of the utmost importance for your property when selling it to pay attention to the laws of supply and demand. It determines the amount of showing activity which in turn can determine contract activity. Generally, you should be averaging between 8-12 showings in a 45-60 day period, and if you’re not, the market is likely indicating your property is overpriced. If you feel your property might be experiencing this issue, please let us know and we will tackle this issue head on to find out what the concern is and correct it. 

You must be a subscriber of The POLTROCK TEAM’s
Bi-Weekly Real Estate Update to get the Link to
the sold properties for the past 14 Days.
See sold prices, pictures, and descriptions of what’s sold!
Email John at JohnPoltrock@gmail.com and join our SOLD Update!

We continue to work harder than ever to get your property the proper exposure and get it sold. We’ve found more success and sales even in this market because we strive to expose your property to the world so buyers can find it and to make you the most appealing and competitive property in the market. We are thankful for the opportunity to serve you and are there to help you in any way we can! Please email or call us if you have any questions or if we can do something to help you.

 With that said, we wish you a wonderful weekend. If we can help you or someone you know with their real estate needs, it will be a privilege for us to serve them. We’d love to take great care of them and thank you for all your referrals.

The Poltrock Team’s Murphy NC SOLD Real Estate Update for June 22, 2009

Happy Fourth of July! Yes, it is a bit early (that and you won’t get another update till after then! ;), but it’s one of our favorite Holidays because we celebrate our freedom. Although sometimes we feel like our country could be ran better at times, we have the greatest democracy the world has ever known. It could be far worse – we could live in Afghanistan!
 
Enough of the ramble and now on to the real estate market in Murphy NC! The past 2 weeks have been quite active averaging a sale every 15 hours – nice! 22 Properties have sold in the past 14 days, and holding true to what it has been for this entire year, homes have been the most active to sell. It’s holding that way for inquiries as well… for every land inquiry we receive, we get 3-4 home inquiries. It’s an interesting phenomenon that historically is not true at all here. Land usually sells 1.5-2 to 1. The good thing is that land parcels are selling, and I do have to admit that large tracts, unless incredibly well price (read: cheap), are practically stagnant.
 

You must be a subscriber of The POLTROCK TEAM’s
Bi-Weekly Real Estate Update to get the Link to
the sold properties for the past 14 Days.
See sold prices, pictures, and descriptions of what’s sold!
Email John at JohnPoltrock@gmail.com and join our SOLD Update!

Here are some statistics over the past 14 days:
Homes
–      Average List Price – $183,194
–      Average Sold Price – $163,194
–      List to Sold Price Ratio – 89.33%
–      Average Days on Market – 341
–      Total Sold – 17
–      Homes Actively for Sale in Cherokee County: 883
–      Homes Currently “Pending” Sale: 31
 

Land
–      Average List Price – $60,760
–      Average Selling Price – $41,000
–      List to Sold Price Ratio – 71.09%
–      Average Days on Market – 326
–      Total Sold – 5
–      Largest Tract to Sell – 1.11+/- Acres
–      Land Actively for Sale in Cherokee County: 2,316
–      Land Currently “Pending” Sale: 90
 
Advice: Despite what rumor and the media says, real estate is selling! Remember that and don’t be discouraged because your property doesn’t “Fly off the Shelf.” There are 3 P’s that are making real estate sell right now:

1)      Presentation – Keep it clean, fresh, comfortable (that means keep the AC on 72-74), and “staged.”

2)      Price – This is incredibly important to be on point for your price. If you’re overpriced in the market, you’re helping sell all the other homes that are correctly priced. Wondering about yours? Ask us! We can help.

3)      Patience – You’ve got to have this one! Even if you have all the above perfect, you’re still going to have to wait. It’s a lot of work to keep your home presentable and priced right, and without this, all the rest doesn’t matter. There’s a lot of agent “hopping” in the market where people will list their house, not sell in 6 months, and change their agent. This isn’t in your best interest. You chose the agent you like and trust and stick with them. When homes are taking an average of 11.36 months to sell in the past two weeks, 6 months simply doesn’t make sense or match the odds. Vegas casinos don’t win in the long run by going against the odds. Sit back, be patient, make your agent work, and talk to them! The advice you get is worth the weight in gold.
 
We thank you for your business – we’re here for you! Anytime we can do anything for you, please give us a call. Although you don’t hear from us every day, we’re behind the scenes sometimes constantly working to generate buyers and closings for our clients. So far, this year is going great and we’re going to keep it up.
 
We have a closing today at 11:30, so today’s another great day for real estate! 😉 Have a wonderful 4th and be safe out there.

John Poltrock – The POLTROCK TEAM at REMAX Mountain Properties – www.MyMurphy.com – Call Toll-Free 1-866-6877496 – Murphy’s #1 Real Estate Team

The Bi-Weekly SOLD Murphy NC Real Estate Update

Happy Post-Saint Patty’s Day!! The weekend is almost here and the weather is GORGEOUS in Murphy! Nice and sunny in the 60’s is a great reason to get outside.

 

Real Estate is producing a sale a day on average (factoring homes and land both), which is not to shabby! The market is slower right now with 30 sales in the past month compared to 39 sales per month last year. The difference is not in homes – they’re still extremely comparable to last years. Land is what’s making the difference. Sales are down to around half of what they normally are. Buyers are beginning to call and see land, which is exciting! Land has so many great investments out there right now, it’s time for buyers to begin seeing the opportunities that are in front of them.

 

Historically, sales pick back up and our “season” begins when Spring Break starts, which we’ve only got 3 more weeks till that hits!

 

You must be a subscriber of The POLTROCK TEAM’s
Bi-Weekly Real Estate Update to get the Link to
the sold properties for the past 14 Days.
See sold prices, pictures, and descriptions of what’s sold!
Email John at JohnPoltrock@gmail.com and join our SOLD Update!

 

 

 

If you have any questions or concerns about your property, give us a call! We’ll be in the office for the rest of the day and you can reach us here, toll-free, at 1-877-837-3002. Thank you for your business – we’re hard at work for YOU!

The State of the Real Estate Market and Sales in Murphy, North Carolina

Good morning from cloudy Murphy, North Carolina! If you’re not here, you’re missing out on cool and comfortable weather – it’s great for it not be so doggone cold! 😉

As you likely know, real estate markets in Murphy NC are interesting right now. January yielded 18 home sales in Cherokee County, which is only down by one sale from this time last year. That’s a great step in the right direction! Buyers are certainly looking for homes, and there are a lot of good opportunities out there for them. In our most recent tri-weekly newsletter for buyers (we have well over 500 prospective buyers on that list), there were some really amazing deals (To Join this List, Email JohnPoltrock@gmail.com with JOIN in the Subject line). A few foreclosures were in the list… and overall we’re quite lucky because we do not have to compete with foreclosures nearly as much as many buyers like to think we are.

Land, on the other hand, is quite a bit down from this time last year. There were 8 land closings in January compared with an average of 20 sales per month from the first quarter of 2008. Land is still selling pretty well and it must be aggressively priced in order to make the “under contract” list. We’ve put one parcel under contract and likely have two more on the way. All are exceptional buys for the buyer and the sellers are tickled pink to move their property.

Here would be a link to the properties that have sold in the past 14 days. Included are photos, information, list and sold price. To recieve this information, join our Bi-Weekly SOLD Real Estate Update for FREE! Email JohnPoltrock@gmail.com with Bi-Weekly Update in the Subject to be added!

We will continue to work tirelessly on selling real estate! If there’s anything we can do to help you with your property, please give us a call, email, text message, or any other way that’s convenient for you. If  We’re in business for you and we’re thankful for you!

The POLTROCK TEAM at RE/MAX Mountain Properties – www.MyMurphy.comJohnPoltrock@gmail.com – Call Toll Free at 1-866-687-7496

What’s Happened to the Value of My Real Estate in Murphy, North Carolina?

Real estate in Murphy NC, as for most of the United States, is a high topic of conversation. Whether it’s about an individual home or land or the prices of them, you can expect to hear about it at any local hangout. Now, most folks don’t walk around and openly say, "my home is worth a gajillion dollars," but they do watch what’s selling and for sale in their neighborhood.What's the value of my Murphy NC Real Estate???

So it’s natural to wonder, "What’s happened to my property value over the last few years?"

Since Murphy, NC doesn’t have subdivisions with 100’s of the exact same house, it’s difficult to track a definite percentage of how much our market has adjusted. Fortunately, there’s still a good way to calculate it based on a popular style of houses. Like most areas, we do have a popular style. And nope, it’s not stucco, brick, or any of the common houses you see in primary markets. We have a popular home style called the chalet.

Because we have many chalets for sale and in turn help families buy a lot of them, we can get a rough idea of what the market has done. Without a doubt, these numbers will not apply to every home – especially unique ones. This is intended to give you a benchmark.

Market Summary

 

2006

2007

2008

2006 to 2007 Difference

2007 to 2008 Difference

2006 to 2008 Difference

List Price

 $253,031

 $269,155

 $237,730

 Up 6.37%

 Down 11.68%

 Down 6.05%

Sales Price

 $246,777

 $259,757

 $217,813

 Up 5.26%

 Down 16.15%

 Down 11.74%

List to Sale Ratio

 97.37%

 97.01%

 91.99%

 Down 0.37%

 Down 5.17%

 Down 5.53%

Days on Market

 111

221

225 

 Up 99%

 Up 1.8%

 Up 102.70%

*Based on an average of all 2/2 chalets on a basement sold in Cherokee County in the given year as sold across the Mountain Lakes Board of Realtors®. You can view more market statistics on our Murphy NC State of the Market Reports.

The large and short of it is that we have seen sale prices decline about 11.74% over the last 20 months. The stock market has lost 13.3% in 2008 alone (based on the DJIA index). With that said, it appears your money is far more stable and secure in the tangible asset of real estate rather than stocks.

This chart is a great indicator as to how the market trends. The year 2007 was our transition year where values began to decline. One of the largest indicators as to this is that days on market practically doubled while prices still increased. This indicates that although there was appreciation, it took longer for buyers to find and buy homes on the market. Since days on market is remaining quite stable, it shows a strong sign our market is reaching the "trough" (or bottom) of the business cycle.

Since it looks like we’re riding the wave at the bottom of the market, now is a great time to buy. You can purchase your real estate at low prices that we haven’t seen in years. If you’re waiting for the market to go up, you’ll miss out on huge amounts of appreciation that’s in store for us soon.

Are you considering selling and want to know what this data means for your individual property? Contact your local Cherokee County Realtor® for a free market analysis to interpret what your home is now worth. If you’d like us to research it for you, please feel free to call us or use our FREE Online "What’s My Home Worth?" form. 

Are you considering buying and want to find the best buy on the market? Be sure to contact a local Realtor®. They’re the ones living and breathing real estate and you should rely on their expertise. You can also call us to find your new property or use our FREE Online "Find My Dream Home!" form.

Written By: John Poltrock, your Cherokee County Certified Residential Specialistwww.MyMurphy.comCall Toll Free (866) 687-7496 and demand The POLTROCK TEAM! – Real Estate in the Mountains of Murphy, North Carolina – Email me at JohnPoltrock@gmail.com – RE/MAX Mountain Properties

*Watch for this article in the upcoming issue of the Cherokee Scout’s Country Roads, which is the *new* real estate section of Cherokee County’s newspaper. Be sure to subscribe to the Scout newspaper and have it delivered at your home for 38 cents per week!