Boston Real Estate Market

I put together some numbers for an email on the Boston real estate market, and thought I'd share them here with you. Below I pasted the spreadsheet with some stats (click on it for a readable view), but here are two highlights:

• I estimate that the total commissions collected by real estate firms for sales in Boston has decreased 24% (from $177MM to $142MM) this past year compared to the year October 7, 2004 to 2005. However, the decline in commissions has not been steady, with the sharpest decline this past year. I expect this to translate to market consolidation of brokerages.
• Looking at all property types, average sale prices and listing prices have not fallen significantly over the past year, and in fact have risen 5% to 7% over October 2004-2005 in Boston. Rather than affecting price, the market slowdown has most affected volume and the number of days it takes for a property to sell. This may not be true for all market segments, but it is at least superficially promising that value has not decreased.

[click on the image for a readable view of the spreadsheet]
I'd be interested to hear your comments on what you think this means.