Hi, friends. It's Friday, which means I'm going to come to you live sharing a little bit of content, information, need to know about real estate in the Charleston market, and maybe a little bit of insight about what's happening across the nation. So real quick, this is my sixth Friday in a row to be traveling. Summertime is here and like so many other families, I get to travel and try to keep up with my kids' schedules. Summer is a schedule disruptor, that is for sure. So I'm trying to make the most of it with my family and having a little fun for myself. I hope that you're getting the opportunity to do the same, but what I do not ever tap out of is business.

And I tease a lot of times and I say the beauty of real estate is I can take it anywhere. The downside is I get to take it everywhere. So I'm committed to bringing you information every Friday about what the market's doing, and a little bit of insight, maybe about what to expect in transactions. So thank you for watching live if you are and if you're watching this as a replay, thank you for tapping in. Always set your notifications to alert if you want to. And if you find that it's relevant information and want to share it, please do so. Tag your friends, tag your family, tag your mama, tag your daddy, whoever needs to know about real estate, because if you own property, guess what? You need to understand what's happening in the market today. Because it's an investment. I don't care if you're living in it as your primary residence or maybe you're interested in buying an investment property and building wealth in real estate.

It is always relevant if you own property or are interested in property. So what's happening in the market today? Well, we are learning that there's about 22 active listings in our MLS and the Charleston tri county area, which incorporates Charleston, Berkeley and Dorchester County of the Charleston area. But nationwide inventory is starting to gain. So we are seeing more opportunities for buyers. So we're really starting to see this shift from what we would classify as needs and wants.

And so in the past year and a half or so, it's been very focused on what buyers' needs are. There wants, their want list, it really comes very secondary and perhaps even not important if they are wanting or needing housing, then a lot of times we just really have to look and see what is on the market that meets those absolute needs and is in their price point and then go after it with everything we've got. We're starting to see a shift as the inventory increases nationwide, especially in our MLS. We're really starting to see more opportunities for buyers and getting to nail down some more of those wants that they've pinpointed for us.

And so needs versus wants have been very different over the last year and a half. So some things that we've really noticed as well, whereas we've been doing business under that mindset of waving home inspections in some cases in some markets, not in all markets, but in some markets we've been waving home inspections. That's not advised in most cases and it's not a regular business practice that we're seeing right now either. So we're really starting to come back to the basics of our business as usual let's say, and a good, healthier business, a better way of doing business. So let's stay focused on what we can control on our contract agreements. And we are going into more of a due diligence period with clients. And so it just overall a better, healthier way of doing business. And we can really focus on again, those needs for what the seller wants and what our buyer wants.

It's becoming more of an equalized housing opportunity for a lot of our buyers in the marketplace. And I do believe that will continue through the next six months. Our federal government has raised not interest rates, but they've done some impacts on the economy that has in essence raised our interest rates and it has slowed down the buying power a little bit. We are still seeing a lot of buyers on the market. They're just having more opportunities for what they can match with and having a better opportunity to be able to secure the house not only that they need, but also that they want. So if you are ready to buy, if you are... Maybe your rent has increased or maybe it's just, you don't love your house and you've been scared to list it, not knowing what the opportunities would be for the buying side.

Let's talk about it, reach out to me. And now's a great time to talk about what your needs are and also what your wants are. Let's talk about the housing market in our local area though, for just a moment. We've had a bit of a slowdown on the buying side, we had 337 residential properties come on the market and under contract actually let me restate that, 337 residential properties go under contract this past week. Now, where is the buying trend? Where is the most activity happening? It's still in Berkeley County. It has been in Berkeley County and I don't see any end in sight. They do a great economic development over in Berkeley county and we are still seeing that the majority of opportunities for buying and selling are happening in Berkeley County. For instance, 89 out of the 337 properties that went under contract this week, 89 of them were over in Berkeley County and 17 of those were in new construction.

For kind of a reflection on what is happening in the rest of the market, let's use Mount Pleasant for instance. So I've got my report in front of me. 27 properties went under contract over in Mount Pleasant and that is single family properties. The median sales price was $795,000. And that rounds out to be $337 a square foot, $337 a square foot and only three of those are new construction. Versus if we look at that Berkeley County area, those 89 single family properties that went under contract, we are at a median sales price of $370,000 and it's just shy of $200 a square foot. So a lot more value in Berkeley County, great quality of life, but with 17 new construction, we're just seeing a lot more new construction happening over there. And in essence, we're going to see more sales happening over there.

Just to give you some insight for my Summerville viewers, 55 properties sold in Summerville for a median sales price of $339,000, which puts us at $190 a square foot median sales price. So if you own property in those different areas, that'll give you a little bit of a temperature. Now those are median. It all is dependent on your property, your value, the condition of it. Because we understand that market prices not only are reflective of the location, but also the condition of the property. At any time you're interested in learning about what your property is valued at, not because you want to sell it, but just because you're curious, maybe you want to pull some equity, maybe pull a HELOC off of the property and use that money that you have built in because everybody's gained a lot of equity in their homes in the last couple of years. Maybe you're interested in pulling a HELOC and so that you can use your money to go and purchase an investment property. I'm strong on building wealth in real estate.

It's an excellent opportunity. I think we need to be divided in our investments. And so if you're interested at any point in doing that, reach out to me, I'd be glad to share information and insight into the best way to accomplish that goal. At any time, reach out to me, (843)-297-1935. I'm here for your real estate needs. And if you just want some contacts for business partners in the area, I'm a great resource for that as well. Take care, have a great holiday weekend. I look forward to seeing all your pictures and fun that you're having on social media. Make sure to connect with me at any time. Have a great day, bye guys.