David H. Haffenreffer

In a town where the average price of a home is nearly $3,000,000 it's a godsend to get a listing you can be proud of that is priced below $1,000,000. I am fortunate to have listed just such a house this week. It's located on Indian Field Road on the edge of central Greenwich over near Cos Cob. I held the first broker open house and had about 50 agents come through to see the place. The feedback was nearly all positive: good condition, nicely updated, clean, shows well, and priced well. The latter is what I hope will draw the buyers.

Greenwich is a great town with lots of wonderful aspects: proximity to NYC, cosmopolitan Greenwich Avenue, top-rated public schools, highly regarded museums and libraries and our incredible parks. My thinking is this: if someone can purchase this house and gain access to a town with so much to offer it's a total homerun.

We've had a total of four showings since it came on the market. I'll start compiling feedback for the owners tomorrow. I've already posted it on three MLS's including the Greenwich MLS, Connecticut Statewide MLS and the Greater Fairfield County CMLS. Combined they serve as a full-throttle way to expose expose expose that listing to the throngs of internet surfing buyers out there.

I'll keep you updated on the progress....

February sales in Greenwich dropped from the same period a year ago. Twenty-six single family homes sold, compared to 29 in February of 2007. That's a 10% decline and follows a 42% decline in January 2008. Average prices declined nearly 13% to $2,133,000. Median prices fell $10.5% in the month. One highlight in February was a $10.1 million sale in back country Greenwich.

Despite the seemingly poor start to the new real estate year, we have seen a real uptick in people coming out and looking so hopefully March will help improve the overall quarterly statistics.

As I sit to write this, it's a snowy February day. The Greenwich public schools are on holiday and the private schools have a snow day. It's a day that gives me a chance to catch up on paperwork, website updating and to think about how busy it's been in the last 90 days or so. If you look at the 2007 stats, it was a strong year in the Greenwich real estate market. Average prices rose 12% to nearly $3,000,000 while median prices gained 8% to $2,100,000. But that's not necessarily how it felt because average Days On Market expanded 16% to 180 days. A longer marketing period resulted in more price cuts which appears to be bringing buyers out early this year before the influx of new Spring inventory.

Who are the buyers out now? The smart ones, I think. They smell opportunities in the tired listings of last year while hoping to pit them against the new listings coming on for the Spring market. The bidding from the buyers I'm working with is starting about 15% - 20% below current listing prices and, happily, the sellers are willing to talk.

What's changing? Well, I think the low interest rates appear to be giving buyers more confidence to bid even if the bid is a low-ball offer. As agent, I always believe it's our job to foster a conversation between the buyers and sellers so this is all good news.

Are you seeing or feeling the same in your market?