Summer Real Estate Activity – “On Track!”
The Seabrook Island real estate market continued to be quite active over the summer and I would call it “on track” with our goal of 150 sales on the island in order to beat last year’s 141 sales.
The current 10-year average of sales on the island is 130. This includes all of the lean years during the recession, but not the “Bubble” year of 2005. With a successful final quarter, we have a good chance of having the sixth straight year of sale increases on Seabrook. At the mid-August point, when this was written, there were 109 properties either closed or under contract waiting to close, versus 101 when I was writing this same edition one year ago.
It is these sales that are helping to drive Club membership to its current all-time high of 1,765 and creating the financial success story that is Seabrook Island and Island One. The numbers include 43 villas with an average sale price of $283,000, 47 homes with an average sale price of $677,000 and 19 building lots with an average sale price of $238,000. All of these categories show increases over last year.
The most interesting category is building lots where the average sales price went from $167,000 to $238,000. The vast majority of these home sites were purchased by buyers with imminent plans to build a new home. One could surmise they represent buyers who are at the higher price range and chose to build a new home rather than purchase an existing home. This tracks with the trend of buyers looking for “newer.” This can mean either new construction or an existing older home that has gone through major renovations. Either way, it shows the continued growth of confidence in both Seabrook Island and the overall state of the real estate market.
The downside is that there remains a high inventory of about 100 home sites for sale. This speaks to the lack of demand from the “pure investor,” spec builders and buyers with longer range plans to eventually build.
The success of the new construction Salt Marsh Townhomes, as well as several 2015 re-sales of townhomes in that community, also tracks with both the trend of buyers looking for “newer” and building of confidence. The “Salt Marsh At Seabrook” developers have now applied for an additional building permit to begin more new units in Phase II of that community.
Hope ya’ll had a great summer! As always, please feel free to call me to talk about the Seabrook real estate market.
Joe Salvo
Broker-In-Charge
843.768.7796 • jsalvo@seabrookislandclub.com