Portland Real Estate – Sales activity in the Portland Metro area showed mixed results in January 2011.Closed sales began the year at a higher level than January 2010 and January 2009. Inventory also saw a lower level than the fi rst month of 2009 and 2010, dropping 1.3 months compared to January 2010. Closed sales were up 5% in January 2011 compared to January 2010. Pending sales were down 3%, and new listings dropped 20.5%. Comparing the previous month of December 2010 with January 2011, closed sales fell from 1,462 to 1,035 (-29.2%). However, pending sales grew from 1,210 to 1,489 (23.1%), and new listings jumped from 1,925 to 3,128 (62.5%). At the month’s rate of sales, the 11,697 active residential listings would last about 11.3 months. The average sale price for January 2011 declined 11.9%compared to January 2010. The median sale price also fell 10.4%. Month to month, comparing December 2010 to January 2011, the average sale price went down from $278,000 to $248,900 (-10.5%) while the median sale price also dropped from $230,000 to $215,000 (-6.5%). Read more