Buyers are out there, sales are up, you know what’s next!
It’s not the mid 2000’s by a long shot but the critical shortage of inventory, historic highs in consumer confidence and interest rates trickling upwards are creating price pressures in many areas and price points. If you are a buyer and are looking under 400K get ready for a bidding war in many locals. Buyers need to have a forward looking attitude when it comes to prices in many communities. February’s 5K over list offer in a lot of places will be July’s 5K under list price.
We are still down over 40% on inventory levels from 2 years ago but there is some good news on the horizon. Based on strong anecdotal evidence from our Platinum Club and internal discussions at RE/MAX Gateway we are expecting a strong spike in listings coming on the market in the next several weeks. Of course in some areas, specifically single family homes where the timing of the school year is important, expect increased competition as new buyers enter the market.
Speaking of buyers did you know that last year Millennials made up 40% of the market and this year are projected to be 47%. This is good news since the move up market is driven by first time buyers.
Despite all of this guess what? Condition and pricing are still important! If you are way off on either of these your home will sit and you’ll be anxiously scratching your head wondering why, though by all rights you shouldn’t be. It’s still a strong strategy to get your home in top shape, get a great agent and marketing plan and price aggressively towards the top end of the range of the market and let the competition take you to new heights. One of our biggest roadblocks to price appreciation now is appraisals, though as the early year sales close and become comps some of that issue will be ameliorated.
So if you are buying call me so I can help you to best position yourself to win those competitive situations and if you are selling I’ll guide you on what to do and not to do to prep your home and we’ll put together a winning pricing strategy together as a team!
It’s a good life.
Chris