Wilmington Area Fail-To-Sell Rates Tick Up

Host: Morning, morning! Grab your coffee, everybody, because it's Monday and that means Buddy's here with the numbers. Buddy, good to see you.

Buddy Blake: Hey, good to be here. Yeah, we got a full plate this week — all five counties, plus we're gonna zoom in on New Hanover, Brunswick, Pender, and then Wilmington and Leland specifically.

Host: Okay, so let's just start broad. What's the overall picture across all five counties right now?

Buddy Blake: So right now there's five thousand, eight hundred sixty-four homes for sale across all five counties. Five hundred nineteen of those are new this week, and two thousand, five hundred one are already under contract. Median asking price is landing around four hundred ten thousand dollars.

Host: Wow, that's a lot of homes on the market. So there's real inventory out there right now.

Buddy Blake: There really is. And it breaks down differently depending on where you look. New Hanover's got thirteen hundred fifteen active listings, median asking around five hundred twenty-one thousand. Brunswick's the biggest by far — twenty-six hundred forty-four for sale, median asking four hundred eleven thousand. And Pender's got four hundred seventy-nine homes on the market, median asking five hundred twenty thousand.

Host: Interesting, Pender's asking prices are right up there with New Hanover even though it's a much smaller market.

Buddy Blake: Yeah, it kind of surprises people. And then if we zoom into Wilmington and Leland specifically — Wilmington's got nine hundred sixty-eight homes for sale, ninety-two new this week, median asking four hundred fifty-nine thousand. Leland's a smaller pool, four hundred seventy-three for sale, median asking four hundred fifteen thousand.

Host: Okay so that's the snapshot of what's on the market right now. Let's talk about what actually happened over the last year. How are homes actually selling?

Buddy Blake: So across all five counties, the median sold price over the last twelve months was three hundred seventy-four thousand, with a true days on market of forty days. And here's the good part — homes sold for ninety-seven point four percent of their first asking price.

Host: That's really strong, honestly. Buyers are paying almost full price.

Buddy Blake: They are, if the home's priced right from day one. That's the key phrase there — from day one.

Host: Okay, I feel like there's a 'but' coming.

Buddy Blake: There is. Twenty-three percent of listings across the region failed to sell last year — meaning they expired, got withdrawn, or got canceled. That's up from twenty-one percent the year before.

Host: Wait, so almost a quarter of listings just... didn't sell at all?

Buddy Blake: Right, and it's worse in some counties. New Hanover went from twenty-three percent up to twenty-six percent. Pender jumped the most — eighteen percent up to twenty-four. Brunswick went from twenty-two to twenty-four. Wilmington's sitting at twenty-three, Leland at twenty-one, and honestly even those two, which have solid sale-to-ask numbers, still saw more listings die on the vine than the year before.

Host: So what does that actually tell you as an agent looking at this?

Buddy Blake: It tells me there's not much middle ground left. Homes priced and prepped right are selling close to asking in about a month. Homes that aren't priced right are just sitting there till the listing dies. There's no in-between anymore where an overpriced house just eventually finds its buyer. That doesn't really happen much now.

Host: That's a real wake-up call for anyone thinking about listing and just kind of testing a high number to see what happens.

Buddy Blake: Exactly. This is not the market to guess on price and hope buyers come around. You gotta get it right the first time, because you may not get a second shot at fresh eyes on that listing.

Host: Okay, let's flip it — what does all this mean if you're a buyer right now?

Buddy Blake: For buyers, honestly, there's real inventory to work with. Five thousand, eight hundred sixty-four homes for sale, five hundred nineteen new ones just this week. If you're patient and you know where to look, there's choices out there.

Host: And I imagine the mortgage rate plays into how far that money goes.

Buddy Blake: It does. Freddie Mac's thirty-year fixed average was sitting at six point nine five percent as of September seventeenth. That changes what your monthly payment looks like on any of these median prices, so run your own numbers before you fall in love with a house.

Host: That's smart advice. What about days on market — does that vary a lot by county for buyers who might want more room to negotiate?

Buddy Blake: It varies quite a bit, actually. Wilmington's moving fast, true twenty-seven days. New Hanover overall is thirty. Pender's thirty-eight. But Brunswick County is running fifty-six days, and Leland's at fifty-one. So if you're not in a rush, there might be more room to negotiate in those two areas, especially on anything that's been sitting a while.

Host: Good to know. So if you had to point to one thing everybody listening should really pay attention to this week, what is it?

Buddy Blake: Watch that fail-to-sell rate. It moved up in every single area I track — New Hanover, Brunswick, Pender, Wilmington, Leland, all of it. When a quarter of listings in a county are expiring or getting pulled without selling, that's not a random blip. That's a signal a lot of sellers are overpricing, under-preparing, or both.

Host: So if somebody's gearing up to list their home, what should they actually be asking their agent?

Buddy Blake: Ask hard questions about how they plan to avoid you becoming part of that statistic. Pricing, prep, the whole strategy — don't just take a number and hope.

Host: This was such a good rundown, Buddy. Anything else you want folks to know before we wrap up?

Buddy Blake: Just that if you want to talk through what these numbers mean for your specific street or your specific plans, give me a call or text at nine-one-zero, three-nine-five, one-thousand. Happy to walk through it, no pressure, just straight answers.

Host: Love that. And we've got the full article linked in the show notes if you want to go back and look at all these numbers yourself. Buddy, thanks so much for breaking it all down.

Buddy Blake: Thanks for having me. Talk to you next Monday.