Flathead Lake Real Estate – April 2019 Sales
Spring has officially arrived in the Flathead! With warm days in the 70s, flowers and blooms have exploded in colors all along the lake. The cherry blossoms are hitting their peak the second week of May this year and it is truly a sight to behold.
Sales of Flathead Lake real estate were off to a sluggish start for the first quarter of 2019. April delivered the spring wake-up call with six waterfront sales, including two significant sales over the $1M mark. Sales through the end of April are about $1M ahead of last year’s activity to date.
With interest rates staying low and a national economy that continues to grow, we expect we may see another record sales year for the Flathead Lake real estate market.
April Sales:
Prices based on a per-waterfront-foot have continued to increase to around $4,000/ft for the entire lake after adjusting for improvements in the past few years.
Annual Sales Data:
Active Waterfront Listings
Residential waterfront listings for this month are down slightly compared to the inventory at this time last year (101 vs 106). The number of land listings has decreased from 34 to 25. Total listings on the lake historically peak in August and bottom out between January and March. The market carried a higher number of residential units through the winter this year compared to previous years. The big spring jump in inventory last year (87 to 106) was reduced to a smaller increase this year (93 to 101).
Median list prices for residential listings rose steadily throughout 2018. Prices peaked at $1.6M at the end of the year as inventory dropped with increased sales. The higher inventory over the first quarter of the year has held residential prices down. Median price for May dipped to just under $1.3M.
Median waterfront land prices held steady for most of 2018, showing a $150k spike for the past two months due to a few high priced listings and meager inventory.
Flathead Lake Condominium Market
With over a dozen waterfront condominium communities around Flathead Lake, there are plenty of options for buyers who want the waterfront lifestyle without having to worry about maintaining a lake home. Below is a list of all of the current condo listings for the various communities around the lake, along with a report of total sold units and average prices since the first of the year.
The waterfront condo market is posted 31 sales on the lake last year. With 46 active condo listings, we have approximately 15 months of inventory currently on the market. This is down from highs over the past few years where we saw as much as a three to four year inventory on the market.
Sold prices continue to move upwards, and listing prices downward to meet realistic market values. This has resulted in an increase of sales – especially in the Bigfork market.
