This week also begins the annual Sundance Film Festival. The Sundance Film Festival is the largest festival for independent film producers and always draws a huge crowd. The opening weekend is always the busiest with Main Street in Park City turned into a snowy version of Hollywood complete with star sightings. The Sundance Film Festival parties are the hottest ticket in town with locals using every connection they have to gain entry. Other than the traffic and that the restaurants are full, this is a great time to ski as the slopes are quiet and this year the snow is great.
I think that everyone here in Park City, real estate agents, merchants and lodging companies are thrilled that 2009 is over and that they survived. While 2009 was a very poor year for real estate sales the final numbers are not as bad as it felt. For instance, if we look at single family homes in all areas of our MLS the # of sales were up 2.2% and the average sales price was only down 3.7%. However, home sales in town and near the resorts are a different story. Old Town homes and in the vicinity of the Park City Resort showed a 30% increase in the # of homes sold in 2009 from 30 compared to 23 in 2008. But, the average sold price for a home in old town was down 12.8% for the year. Homes in lower Deer Valley saw a 57% decrease in the # of sales, 6 homes sold in 2009 compared to 14 in 2008, but a 29% increase in the average sold price. Deer Crest, a high end ski-in/ski-out community attached to Deer Valley saw 4 homes sold in 2009 compared to 1 in 2008 or a 300% increase but also saw the average sales price drop 43% to just under $3,500,000. Deer Crest is a newer community with spec homes still being built and it appears that several spec home builders just wanted out and lowered their prices to a point where the deal was just too good to pass up. In upper Deer Valley 9 homes sold in 2009 compared to 4 in 2008 for an increase of 125% and once again we saw a decrease in the average sold price of 28.7%. Other area’s around town were similarly mixed for example, Park Meadows, a mostly residential community saw prices drop 12.8% and the # of sales drop 21.7% but near the Canyons Resort, again a mostly ski-in/ski-out community of 2nd home owners, saw sales increase 25% and the average sold price increase to 45%.
Condominium sales for 2009 were generally hit harder than single family homes. For all condominium sales across all areas of the Park City board the # of sales dropped just over 18% and the average sales price dropped 6.6%. However, as we saw with single family homes, to get a true picture we have to look at specific areas and in some cases the reasons for the change. Old Town and the Park City Resort saw the # of sales for condominiums drop 55% last year and the average sales price drop over 33%. I think that this shows that our buyer is now looking for a newer, more modern and updated condo and is willing to buy further from the center of town to get more square footage for their buying dollar. I suspect that we will see this trend continuing for some time. If we look at condominium sales in Deer Crest we see that the average sold price increased over 64%. At first glance this seems very strange as condo sales prices throughout the rest of Deer Valley was significantly down but we have to remember that the St. Regis Hotel started closing it’s condo’s in November so this number reflects the beginning of very high end sales of condominiums in Deer Crest and is not a true reflection of the market. In upper Deer Valley while the # of sales was down 10.5% of 17 sales in 2009 compared to 19 in 2008 the average sold price dropped 28.1% in upper Deer Valley. In the newest area of Deer Valley, Empire Canyon, the number of sales dropped 38.5% which is easy to understand as in 2008 a large condo project was completed and closing. Where in 2009 the condo projects that were completed did not have the advantage of the pre-sales that occurred in the earlier strong part of the market. Also in Empire Canyon, the average sold price dropped 28.8% as investors who purchased earlier with idea of flipping their property and never occupying it were forced to lower their prices in many cases to below where they purchased it in order to get property sold.
Last Sunday was the much anticipated auction of the 8 Silver Strike condominiums in Empire Pass. I attended the auction and was pleased to see that all 8 units offered sold in about 30 minutes of bidding. The 8 units generally sold for 15 to 20% above the minimum bid and averaged $760 per square foot. In addition to the 8 units that sold during the auction a 9th unit was sold just after the auction was concluded. The developer has another 10 units in the project to sell and I am hearing that he is going to price these remaining units in the neighborhood of $760 per square foot. This will make Silver Strike the least expensive condo project in Empire Pass with direct ski-in/ski-out access and full Talisker club membership.
As with all real estate markets the numbers alone do not tell the entire story and the importance of a long time knowledgeable agent is dramatically illustrated.
This weekend I am traveling to Crested Butte, CO to meet with other resort real estate agents from the western ski resorts. Come back next week for a recap of resort real estate from resorts in California, Idaho, Wyoming, Colorado, Utah and British Columbia Canada. I expect that our discussions will be lively, interesting and very revealing.
