So 2016 is now in the books and its time to see how a year changed property prices in Ocean City. Did they go up, stay level or go down? Did volume increase? And which segments saw the most movement?

Well here are the answers. The first thing to note is that we did see a reasonable increase in overall sales last year, up 9% over 2015 with a total of 1333 units sold. Driven by record low interest rates and more realistic expectations from sellers, the overall market fared pretty well.

The average listing price increased by a very marginal $600 yet the sales price increased by almost $3,750. This dropped the discount that a buyer negotiates from the original listing price down to 8.6% compared to the 10% levels we saw a few years ago, with most properties selling for around 5% less than their final listing price.

As you can see, it still takes almost 6 months to get a property under contract and if you add the typical 6 week settlement time, its currently normal to take 7 months or so to offload a property. Almost 45% of sellers reduced their asking price at least once prior to final negotiations. These properties took on average around 300 days to sell whereas the properties that set more realistic prices at outset and received offers on their original listing prices only took 70 days on average to receive an offer that was acceptable.

Steve Marriner is a licensed Real Estate Agent based in Ocean City, Maryland working with The Carol Proctor Team "#1 at the Beach" and Berkshire Hathaway Home Services/PenFed Realty.

If you have any questions about how your property would sell or if you are looking to buy a home in the area, please call (443) 669-4464