Update: Garrett County Market Update ..

Revisiting the May 2008 housing statistics we can see that both average and median sales prices were down significantly in Garrett County from a year earlier while inventory was up dramatically. In a previous posting I focused mostly on the inventory numbers, but given some things I've read recently about average sales prices showing that property values are clearly rising in Garrett County I thought I should revisit the topic. Based on May 2008 data, the year-over-year decline in the average sales price of Garrett County real estate was 42.8% while the median sales price declined 47.4%. In each case, these declines were the greatest in the entire state of Maryland. Clearly, this shows that Garrett County property values took quite a beating in May 2008.

More likely, this clearly shows that the average sales price of a small group of properties has very little to do with property values of a much larger group of properties which can vary widely in terms of lot size, square footage, workmanship, location, amenities, etc. The June 2008 data are now out as well, so check back soon for an even more recent picture of the Garrett County market. Clearly things could stand to improve greatly over what had to be considered an awful month of May for those who chose to believe that average sales prices over a window in time correlate directly with individual property values.

Don't forget to check back to Dan's Deep Creek Blog for future updates.