Market Update 5/8/2020- What is the Real Estate Market doing today?
Numbers don’t lie!
This week I decided to investigate the data I have accumulated since March 19th when Shelter in Place Orders were placed in Washington State. Specifically tracking Tri-Cities Multiple Listing Service residential homes. Tracking data is how we gauge the market shifts to help prepare our clients for buying and selling in a shifting market. Expecting to see the market shift I started tracking active, pending, and sold data to put our clients in a better position when negotiating. I am sure you will be surprised to hear our home prices have increased 6.6% since March 19th, 2020. Many people ask how the market is doing expecting me to say not so good and when I share those numbers, I can sense the shock and interest at the same time. What does it mean? Buying today is better than waiting to tomorrow. Sellers listing your home today when you know today’s numbers is better than waiting for a better day. Things can change at any time. Interest rates, inventory, and extended Shelter in Place Orders will all have diverse affects in today’s real estate climate.
These numbers may be shocking, but numbers don’t lie. The low inventory of course places higher demand by the already big buyer pool and the low interest rates are an advantage motivating any buyer searching for a home right now. If we see an increase in the rates buyers will naturally be able to afford less of a monthly payment therefore less price for their new home. Seller’s on the other hand may have to adjust price if that happens to keep buyers interested in their homes. What do we do? Our message is simple to our clients. Telling buyers to keep motivated and ready to act as soon as something hits the market that fits their needs. Being pre-approved by the lender is key to acting now. With the increase in home prices we have seen you can expect to not be hard negotiating on pricing and being creative in the structure of your offer is key to successfully getting seller to say yes.
Sellers get a similar message to not wait to list your homes. We don’t know exactly when the shift will hit or if we are only slightly affected like in 2008. We do know that we will see a shift due to Covid-19. We have already noticed the days on market going from 40-57 days average marketing time for all active homes. This tells us some sellers may have pushed price to far or have been listed longer than the last two months are out of the range for selling in a perceived unstable market. Buyers need to have their jobs back and feel confident to make large purchases. We don’t know if this will continue to rise an affect the pricing and will continue to watch very closely.
Active inventory is fluid daily with homes being listed onto the market and then those going pended with accepted offers going off the market. Active counts on March 19th were 597 going up and down in numbers with a high of 624 actives on April 11th. Many homes hit market 1 day and sold the next. Today 568 homes are available in all pricing points across the market. Which one are you in? Once we break it down it is likely to find buyers who only have limited choices of homes available right now. The key is to be ready to go. We have seen that as soon as a home is listed it goes right under contract if priced properly. Pended or under contract homes climbs to 812 currently. Pending homes stats show that average days on market for the homes getting offers is only 8 days. Sellers now is time to take advantage while inventory is still low, and interest are still helping.
If you need to sell and then want to buy, then getting your home’s market value in today’s market is something we can help you with. We have lists of buyers waiting on homes. That said our team of aggressive Home Buyer Specialist have been competing every day on the current inventory of active homes putting some of our buyers into contracts. Our Listing Specialist are assisting new sellers with staging and pricing options to get their houses sold. We are currently looking for homes in variety of pricing points.
The Covid-19 Pandemic will have some effect on 2020 but it is still unknown how long or how much impact we will see here in Tri-Cities. We are watching the market daily to guide you through these challenging times. Check back daily for your next report or give us a call to provide you a personal copy of our report.