YORK COUNTY — A statewide real estate association says the outlook for existing home sales in 2018 is positive and that sales for 2017 were up all over Maine, despite an inventory crunch limiting the availability of homes early last year.

Locally, some real estate professionals are say they’re looking for another great year. 

“I had five closings in the first week of 2018 between Biddeford and Saco,” said Bob Letellier, a Realtor/associate broker with ReMax Realty One in Biddeford. “I’ve got another three tomorrow. It’s been a great start to the year.”

“West of the turnpike and the lakes region will be very strong this year,” Arline Fortier a broker with of Town Square Realty in Sanford, predicted.

As well, Fortier said, Sanford has always been a strong market for first-time home buyers and she sees that trend continuing.

Home values showed upward movement throughout 2017 with the statewide annual median sales price reaching an historical high, said Kim Gleason, the 2018 president of the Maine Association of Realtors and owner-broker of McAllister Real Estate in Hallowell.

“The market momentum is in place for a terrific start to 2018,” said Gleason.

Letellier and Roz Anton, also of ReMax Realty One, said the growth of the local economy has helped, along, they said, with the growth at the University of New England. 

“Biddeford has a great geography,” said Anton, who pointed out that some businesses formerly located in Portland are making their way south.

“And now it’s a cool place to come and live,” she said.

“There’s a lot of people coming to Maine,” said Letellier, pointing to a recent sale to a Minnesota family who moved here for a job in the region.

West of the turnpike, Fortier said folks from out-of-state are looking for holiday properties.

“The monies are coming from away, it’s a growing strong market with people looking to take risks on second homes in Shapleigh, Acton and all the lakefront properties,” said Fortier. She said those  buyers are typically in their 40s, looking for summer and weekend property.

“Who is selling? West of the turnpike and in towns like Sanford it’s the older generation selling an older inventory,” said Fortier. Prices are lower on the older homes, appealing to first time buyers, she said.

Fortier  predicted the Sanford market will continue to be strong  and said it will become stronger in the years following the September opening of Sanford’s new high school and regional technical center. 

“We’re moving absolutely in the right direction, said Fortier.

“We’re having a very positive experience and been waiting for this for years, especially in Biddeford,” said Anton. 

She said in the Biddeford and Saco region, the average number of days on the market for a single family home in 2017 was 26. 

As to 2017, statewide, home sales were up by 0.72 percent, or slightly less than three quarters of one percent.

In York County, the figures for existing home sales in 2017 match almost exactly the number sold in 2016, though the median price was up by nearly 8 percent.

Gleason said 2017 was a year of ups and downs across Maine.

“With tight for-sale inventory for the first six months of 2017, buyers were on the sidelines,” Gleason said. “As inventory constraints eased, the sales volume was very strong in the third and fourth quarters. The end result is that 2017 had the most single-family residential sales over the 20 years we’ve been tracking the data.”

According to figures supplied by the agency, there were 17,633 homes sold in Maine in 2017, with a median sale price of $200,000, which was 5.6 percent more than the median sale price in 2016.

A median sale price means half of the homes were sold for more and half sold for less.

In York County, 3,120 existing homes were sold in 2017, two less than in 2016. The median price however, was $257,700, up by 7.82 percent from the $239,000 median in 2016.  Only in Cumberland County was the median price higher than York County, at $285,000, up from $265,000 in 2016.

— Senior Staff Writer Tammy Wells can be contacted at 324-4444 (local call in Sanford) or 282-1535, ext. 327 or twells@journaltribune.com.​