January – December 2012 showed final sales on Flathead Lake to be 49 homes sold and 13 vacant land properties sold. By comparison 30 homes and 3 vacant land lots sold in 2011. At the end of the year there were still 71 waterfront homes available for sale, with only 1 of these being “bank owned”. Five out of the 71 homes for sale were shown as “Pending” at year end but had not yet closed.
Based on the 2012 rate of sale of 49 homes with 71 homes remaining to sell, there is only 1.4 years worth of inventory (absorption rate). (That is about half of the time as shown in 2011 – This shows that Flathead Lake inventory is shrinking as sales pace quickens!)
The highest sale on the lake in 2012 happened in the Fall with a final sales price of $3,400,000; This home was on the market for 5.5 years and was located on beautiful Finley Point on the south end of Flathead Lake. It had over 9,000 sq ft with 330′ of frontage. The least expensive home that sold in 2012 with full navigable frontage was a foreclosed home in Big Arm – it sold for $290,000. Overall, the median sale price on Flathead Lake was $580,000; the average was approx $796,000. The average days on market for the 49 that sold was 521 days.
Besides homes on traditional navigable frontage, there were those that opted to purchase a waterfront condo or townhome that had Flathead Lake access. 25 sales were recorded in 2012 with 12 in Bigfork, 1 in Somers, 4 in Lakeside and 8 in Polson. Most included a deeded dock or boatslip. This is only slightly down from the 28 sales in 2011.
