OC Inventories Up for 6th Report in a Row!

In a break from our regularly scheduled programming...

I read an article and saw some associated postings where real estate agents have been claiming that they have seen rather significant increases in buyer interest and traffic at open houses. So, I go to wondering if either of these factors was actually translating into an increase in sales and a subsequent reduction of inventory.

So, I clicked over to my favorite inventory blog and see what the folks at Bubble Markets Inventory Tracking were reporting and found the following data:

A quick look at this data shows that inventories have been consitently trending upward since the beginning of the year. That leads me to be believe that the increase in traffic really isn't translating into many deals. Must be a lot of looky loos, or maybe a little wishful thinking on the part of some realtors desperate for a little good news.

A couple of other interesting nuggets from the Bubble Markets Inventory Tracking site.

Inventories compared year on year are up dramatically with 13,302 unit of inventory reported for January of 2007 versus only 8,430 for last year, for an increase of nearly 58%! Sales transactions were also down January on January with 2,868 sales last year year versus on 2,400 this year with nearly 500 fewer transactions.

Soft prices, increasing inventory, sales transactions down. Yikes. Sellers gird your loins!