November sales up in northwest Arkansas, down in central

It turns out that real estate is truly local -- sales have trended up all year long in northwest Arkansas, but down in the central part of the state.

Let's start with a look at northwest Arkansas. In November, Realtors in Benton, Carroll, Madison and Washington counties sold 419 new and existing, single-family residences through Arkansas Regional MLS (ARMLS). That’s up 10.55 percent from 379 closed sales in November 2010. The average sales price was $165,966, up 3.07 percent from $161,029 in November 2010. Sellers, on average, netted 94.39 percent of their list prices in November, roughly on par with a 94.86 percent list-to-sales price ratio in November 2010.

Of course, one month doesn’t indicate a trend — taking a look a yearly data generally paints a better picture of what’s going on in a market. Through November, 5,639 homes were sold in northwest Arkansas, up 9.79 percent from 5,136 homes sold through first 11 months of 2010. The average sales price through November was $151,149, down 5.33 percent from the $159,666 average recorded through the first 11 months of 2010. The average list-to-sales price ratio through November was 95.55 percent, up a bit from 94.96 percent last year.

For a look at the complete report as well as commentary from Springdale Realtor , just .

Meanwhile, central Arkansas markets -- those in Faulkner, Grant, Lonoke, Pulaski and Saline counties and the nearby counties of Jefferson and White -- 616 homes were sold in November, down 5.38 percent from 651 sales in the same month last year and down 8.61 percent from 674 sales in the 11th month of 2009. The average sales price was $169,953, up 5.22 percent from $161,518 in November 2010 and up 4.72 percent from $162,293 in the same month in 2009.

As for the year, 7,730 homes were sold in central Arkansas through November — down 11.83 percent from 8,767 sales through the first 11 months of 2010 and down 18.71 percent from 9,509 sales in 2009. The average sales price in 2011 was $158,308 — down 1.37 percent from $160,505 in 2010 and up slightly from $156,908 in 2009.

Those statistics are courtesy of Cooperative Arkansas Realtors MLS ().

For a complete look at the central Arkansas housing market report, just .