Once again we had a pretty good month here in the Ocala area with 369 sales for the month of May. That’s a huge improvement over May 2009 when we had only 253 sales.

Inventory is still high at about 14 months. The Ocala Marion County MLS  has had over 5,000 homes for about a year now. Inventory is actually down from June 2007 when there were 7,167 homes for sale on our MLS. We will have a buyers market until inventory drops well below 6 months or around 2,500 home listings. By the way, a buyers market is more common than a sellers market historically.

There were 146 foreclosures and 41 short sales in May. It is these distress sales that keep prices down. Traditional sales have had to drop their prices in order to compete.

If you’re a buyer, interest rates are at historical lows and prices can’t drop much more. If there is a bottom, this is it.

If you are a seller you can either sell at market value or stay put for the next 3 to 5 years because prices aren’t going up any time soon.