Welcome to the Durango Real Estate Update. My name is Dan Korman, owner broker of Alpenglow Properties, a full service real estate company located in downtown Durango, Colorado. We have a data packed episode for you today with one of the most incredulous numbers of 2023 being, yep, zero. The average price for a single family home in 2023 within the city limits of Durango was the exact same price as last year, landing at $885,000. The average sales price was calculated over 122 sold homes on the MLS in 2023, which was 11% fewer homes sold than in 22, and that was only half the number of homes sold in the 12 month period from June 2020 through June 21. The lower number of sold units can be attributed to an unprecedented absorption rate in 21, creating a new normal level of active inventory commiserate to supply numbers not seen since 2013. This is sort of crazy to think about. Looking at average price and number of homes sold is not necessarily the end all be all of calculating market performance, but it helps draw a really high level picture of what is happening on a macro level. When you take a look at historic appreciation, you’ll notice that from 2012 through year-end 2019, homes within Durango city limits had an average annual appreciation of 5.4% per year. That level of appreciation shot up to an average of 11.25% per year from 2020 through 23, even with that goose egg for the 12 month rolling average at the end of last year. If I was a betting man and I am, I would bet that next year’s appreciation will fall back in line with our pre-pandemic averages. With interest rates potentially dropping to 5.5% this fall, forcing buyers to leave their mom’s basement and re-enter the market. It’s anyone’s guess as to how the residential market will fare in 2024. But as I always suggest, please use your housing and financial goals to make big decisions rather than trying to time the market. This ensures that you are successful in achieving all of your objectives this year. While I could continue to bore you with Durango home stats, like days on market remaining even at 50 days, or month supply increasing 14% to 2.4 months worth of supply. All good news for buyers by the way. I’d prefer to wrap this year end segment with a few insights into the local commercial real estate market. In 2023, 38 commercial properties were leased in Durango with an average lease rate of $20.52 per square foot per year. Due to data constraints within our MLS, it’s hard to break out office versus industrial versus retail rates, but we will have a new lease rate survey from the assessor’s office this year, which I plan to present on in a future video. For commercial sales, Durango has a relatively small data set, but quite a robust market for such a small community. In 23, there were 23 commercial unit sales comprising of almost $25 million in volume. This was a 21% decrease in units sold compared to the year end of 22. Today, there are 38 commercial properties currently available within the Durango City limits. With most prevalent property type being office space. Office space remains to suffer from high vacancy rates nationally, but there’s still a unique niche locally due to our large small business population. If you want industrial space in Durango, you’ll be hard pressed to find a space. This is whether you’re leasing or trying to purchase, and due to our extremely low supply of light industrial in our town. But if you want to buy or lease light industrial space in Mancos, Colorado, you should check out our new listing that just hit the market this year at 651 North Main. It is the only light industrial zoned building in the town of Mancos and comprises over 30,000 square feet of warehouse with two dock height loading doors, and a myriad of other amenities. So thank you so much for tuning into this episode of Durango Real Estate Update. If you would like more information on specific stats in your neck of the woods, please feel free to reach out anytime via email at [email protected]. Or you can send me a DM on Instagram at our handle @DurangoBrokers. Go out there and smile at a stranger today and we’ll see you next time.
