By: Wendy Messina
I've had many conversations with my clients over the past two years about how long this super-hot market will last. Is the market going to crash? How long can prices continue to rise? When will inventory get better? Well, it looks like the market is cooling right now. We've all seen it on the news. In recent weeks I've seen a significant increase in re-sale inventory locally. I've seen builders offer incentives to both real estate agents and buyers. I'm seeing listings that would have been on the market and gone the overnight stay on the market for weeks. I've even seen price decreases!
Is it just the usual summer cool down? Is it the increase in interest rates? Is it because my buyers are busy now putting their docks in at their summer homes? Is it a combination of all the above? Probably. Prices leveled off last summer as well. They started climbing again in October and kept going, until now. Regardless, to all my buyers who have been waiting for the market to change, I say it has changed. To all my buyers who have stopped looking for that special property, I say start looking again. To all my buyers who say they don't want to get into a bidding war, now's the time to make that offer.
Take a look at this from USA Today:
A ‘balanced housing market'
The Fed’s actions to temper inflation appear to be normalizing the market and cooling demand, says Steve Reich, chief operating officer of Finance of America Mortgage.
For the week ending May 27, mortgage applications decreased 2.3% from one week earlier and 14% from the same week one year ago, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association.
“I believe price appreciation is likely to become more gradual over the summer and throughout the duration of the year,” he says. “Inventory has also been on the rise since reaching a low point this January, and this may help ease price appreciation further in some markets.”
That is good news for buyers, Marr says.
“The market’s kind of rebalancing toward a more balanced market where buyers have a little bit more power and sellers have a little bit less pricing power.”
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