Posted on 05/30/2021 3:36:50 AM PDT by Mr. Mojo
How wild is the U.S. housing market right now? So wild, half of the houses listed nationwide in April went pending in less than a week. So wild, one poll found that most buyers admitted to bidding on homes they’d never seen in person. So wild, a Bethesda, Maryland, resident recently included in her written offer “a pledge to name her first-born child after the seller,” according to the CEO of the realty site Redfin. So wild, she did not get the house.
Pick a housing statistic at random, and it’s probably setting an all-time record. Home prices: record high. Inventory: record low. Percentage of homes selling above asking price: record high. Average time on market: record low.
With prices headed to the moon and listings blinking in and out of existence like quantum particles, nobody seems to know exactly when this is going to stop. “In my time studying housing markets, I’ve seen bubbles and I’ve seen busts,” says Bill McBride, an economics writer who famously predicted the 2007 housing crash. “But I’ve never seen anything quite like this. It’s a perfect storm.
(Snip)
You’ve put in several offers, promised sellers everything short of a shrine to their descendants, but you keep losing out. Do you recommit yourself to the Zillow chase, throw in the offspring shrine, and raise your max price in the expectation that things will only get crazier with time? Or do you wait?
“It’s so hard to say without knowing the city, but generally, if you’re in a market where you consistently have to spend significantly above listing, I wouldn’t buy right now,” McBride said. “I think when you put everything together, the odds are that things get more normal in a year.”
(Excerpt) Read more at theatlantic.com ...
3?4 OSB going for $66 a sheet, that was 2 weeks ago.
The housing market is a fickle bi+ch. I bought my place in ‘03 for $142k. By 2007 it was assessed for about $190k. Then the crash, in 2010 it assessed for about $125k. Now similar houses near me are selling in a day or less for $400k or more.
I bought a few 4’x4’ B/C plywood sheets. They cost $48 a piece. That’s crap wood for high dollar.
True. Sold this year and had 7 offers, two of which waived inspections. We elected a conventional offer based on the totality of each offer (not just $ and time but people and likelihood each would be happy in the place ... but it was after all one of the top offers too.
Not at all sure this happens on the Left Coast (minus Portland), without an unwinding of the commercial real estate mortgate market which I have written about here.
Do you have any idea of what California's mass depopulation would be like if there weren't 2 chinamen taking his place? China, like every other evil in the world, is behind this bidding war in the most premium neighborhoods in Kali.
China, surprisingly, is not hard to leave (albeit we will see literally hundreds of forced 'repatriations' for the rest of this decade until war breaks open). Forcing mainland law on HK was the tipping point.
May I suggest you run a M* comparison of REITS, Commodity EFS vs Consumer discretionary ETF & Consumer staples over all time intervals 1m to 15 years. I did that exercise last week and it solidified my choices.
Start at a quote, select see full chart.
In the upper left add a ticker at a time to add comparison.
Then check each time period.
I compared VCR, VDC, VGT, GLD, MORT, VNQ, SPY, GSG and VONG
https://www.morningstar.com/etfs/ARCX/VCR/quote
I guarantee in a bubble market there are first-time home sellers forcing first-time home buyers to waive inspection in a home sold by first-time home realtors, none of whom have any concept of the fact that waiving inspection does not equate to the seller not having to disclose material defects.
My cousin’s mortgage in Basking Ridge NJ 2019 was 3.625%; loans went bit lower after that to 3.125%
You will like AZ, I have enjoyed it the last 8 years.
I have a lake place in rural Missouri that we use in the summer. After 11 years we are selling it due to the distance issues. It went up about 12% between 2009 and 2019. Now it has gone up 50% again in the last 18 months.
“having to disclose material defects.”
Yes, I think you are right about that because most state laws have that included for real estate transactions, unlike say selling a car.
Take the Money
And Run!
I’m sure You enjoyed it
I know I’m looking
Forward to New Advetures!
Cheers!
I think Zillo has a program where you pick out and buy a home they are listing and they will buy your house.
Do you plan to rent for the rest of your life?
Are you going to buy within the 2 year reinvestment limit (for tax purposes).
How close are you to retirement?
If you won't need to be liquid within a 30 day period, look at specialty REITs like MPW returning over 5%. (Yes, I own some)
(It takes time to sell the stock and get the cash available for immediate use.)
If you live anywhere near San Francisco, you could rent out that addition to a Google or Microsoft employee. You could probably cover your mortgage, but you should be careful about how many roommates they’re allowed to have.
^THIS! I'm a real estate investor who's now sold two flips where the buyer waived inspection. They close, take possession, and THEN they still raise hell and bitch about every little thing that they find, to their buyer agent, which comes to our hapless listing agent, to us. Of course, I'll still send my crews back to fix what's reasonable, but need to pull them off other jobs to do so at that point. Waiving inspections is a lose-lose for everyone except the inevitable law firm.
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I closed on 032921 at 2.875%
I can’t figure out why a bank would make a 30 year loan to a guy who is 69 years old.
Same experience here in Northern Virginia.
However, it should be noted that the shortage of housing is not across the board. The shortage is in what are called “starter homes.” I guess the term comes from them being the size and price that lower and lower middle class families start out with (1500-2000 sq ft, 3+/2+). However, asking prices are now running $300k to $400k+. Still, they are being snapped up by local mid 30s to mid 40s families (Millenials) who are tired of being stuck in overpriced rental apartments and small homes. That doesn’t count the usual change over due to assignment/job rotations in DC, etc.
The last statistics I saw said there was less than two weeks of inventory on the market here in Prince William County. The optimal level is what? Three to six months?
Like you, we get flyers all the time from the “We buy your house in 7 days!” scammers. But we are also getting emails and flyers from legitimate real estate agents basically looking for homes, any homes to sell.
Funny thing is, we have gotten flyers from auto dealers want to by our late model SUV and van for “top dollar.” Part of it is,of course, trying to sell you a new (or newer) car but they seem sincere about needing good condition used Inventory to sell. So, same rationale as with homes: a market with eager buyers and too little inventory to sell.
While the article is a little light on details, I think the advice to wait is sound. The psychological state of buyers is not stable at the moment. And the irrational bidding wars, waiving appraisals, and the other buyer nonsense highlighted in the article are evidence of that. As the country and economy open back up, things (and thinking) should settle down and home buyer behavior return to “normal,” (whatever that means , these days).
No doubt sellers who previously had a hard time unloading a flawed home is taking advantage of this situation.
Anybody buying a house from a seller who refuses a home inspection is a fool.
He’s right. I’m a self employed home inspector. My business is about half of what it has been in previous years due to buyers waving inspections. Waiving an inspection is risky.. I’ve saved countless people from buying potential money pits, or houses with major safety issues. I’ve recently inspected houses for people who saw the house on Zillow and made an offer. I’ve never seen anything like it!
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