Philly’s Housing Market Roars Onward, Sale Numbers Highest Since the Recession

Photo credit: Julia Rowe | Flickr

Philadelphia’s housing market is seeing major gains across the board, and according to a new quarterly report from housing guru Kevin C. Gillen, we haven’t seen these kinds of numbers since the Great Recession–or, as is the case with the number of $1 million home sales, ever!

Gillen, senior research fellow at Drexel’s Lindy Institute for Urban Innovation and chief economist of Meyers Research LLC, dug into the Q3 numbers and found the rising tide has become a city-wide phenomenon: “Price appreciation continued across all of the City’s neighborhoods, while sales posted their best quarter in the post-bubble era and million dollar sales broke their all-time historic record.”

Let’s take a peek, shall we?

Philly’s home sales in Q3 soared to 4,655 transactions, the highest volume of sales since 2007, and average days on market has dwindled down to a mere 61 days, again not seen since 2007. Gillen reports that 20% of homes listed in Q3 also sold in that same timeframe, “[this] is the highest level of absorption since the red-hot days of 2005.”

The numbers also confirm what we had known anecdotally: High-end homes are flying off the market. 34 home sales topped the $1 million dollar mark in Q3 (and eight over $2 million), doubling the number seen in the previous quarter (16) and absolutely shattering the previous record of 25 seen in Q3 2008.

At the neighborhood level, West Philly, University City, Kensington/Frankford and South Philly are seeing serious growth, as each area has experienced double-digit price appreciation over the past year. Values in University City and West Philly are up over 21.8% and 20.8%, respectively.

Here’s the neighborhood breakout for the gains seen over the numbers from Q2:

South Philly leads the pack, but values are up across the city.

Here is the longterm breakout:

So it looks as though the Philadelphia housing market is firmly trending upwards, and Gillen doesn’t necessarily think it’s going to slow down anytime soon: “Increased sales activity combined with decreased inventories indicate a relative increase in demand and decrease in supply, which point towards further price appreciation for Philadelphia’s housing.”

Read the full report here.