WE SELL SANCTUARY:

Real estate industry sales statistics for the key Upper Valley municipalities of Hanover, Lebanon, Claremont, Hartford and Woodstock bear out the demand for homes from buyers while at the same time showing a correspondingly shrinking number of homes on the market.

For the two months from May 20 to July 20 for homes under $500,000, there were 261 pending sales in those five key communities, up 40% from 187 during the same period last year, according to data compiled by Four Seasons Sotheby's in Hanover. The number of available homes for sale fell 38% from 224 to 138.

For homes between $500,000 and $1 million, pending sales rocketed up 141% from 22 to 53, and listings plunged 53% from 60 to 28, according to the data.

The imbalance between supply and demand is driving the current frenzied state of the real estate market, said Bruce McLaughry, who heads Sotheby's office in Hanover. That imbalance -- which has persisted for several years in the Upper Valley -- has been made more lopsided by the pandemic, he explained.

"We already had extremely low inventory, but what added to it this year is that a lot of sellers who would normally be coming to market are saying they don't feel comfortable with the COVID virus out there and jumping into the process of moving. So they're sitting on the sidelines, which has resulted in approximately the 50% drop inventory this year," McLaughry said.

Meanwhile buyers, who essentially had to sit on their hands during the economic shutdown from March to early May -- the time of year when home sales kick into high gear so closings and moves can occur during the summer before the start of the school year -- crowded back into the market once travel and other restrictions eased in the second half of May.

"We've had a whole year jammed into a three-month span," McLaughry said. "If something comes on the market and is even reasonably teed up for sale, multiple people will jump on it and make offers."

Kasia Butterfield, a real estate agent who specializes in the Quechee Lakes market and represented the Robbinses in the sale of their condo, said the number of listings and pending sales in Quechee Lakes this year is about at the same level it was last year.

Instead, she said, the telling difference is how quickly homes are selling.

In Quechee Lakes, during the first seven months of the year the median number of days between when a property was listed before it sold was 67 days. Since January, the median number of days on the market has been more than halved, to 31 days.

"If something comes on the market and it's fairly priced, we generally get multiple offers and they sell within a day. That's where the real difference is," Butterfield said.

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