Posted on 05/01/2023 7:06:52 AM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin
MADISON, Wis. -- As the average home cost in Madison soars to $424,000 in 2023's latest city assessments, experts say new homeowners are unlikely to face decreases in value in the near future despite the rapid increase.
President Melissa Bjerke Markgraf and CEO Ruth Hackney from the Realtors Association of South Central Wisconsin joined Naomi Kowles on For the Record to explain the impacts of Madison's red hot housing market after city assessments rose 13.5% from the previous year.
"The last three years, even during the pandemic, were record-setting volume years," Bjerke Markgraf said. "It's shocking double digits going up. Historically, we've been pretty insulated in terms of how that affects our overall economy."
Average home costs in Madison now rival or exceed those of Milwaukee, Hackney said, where the city proper is roughly twice Madison's size. That's left beginning homebuyers in a tough position.
"We just have an inventory problem. We don't have a demand problem; we have a supply problem," Bjerke Markgraf said.
The hallmarks of Dane County's relatively constant growth and resulting housing shortage shouldn't be called a housing bubble in the style of the 2008 recession, both said, in part due to Madison's relative insulation from the recession as well as a difference in economic climates.
"I've lived through the Great Recession as an agent [in the Madison area]. I've been doing this since 1997, and I lived through that. It's a different climate right now; the lending practices are considerably stronger. Again, it's not a demand issue; it's a supply issue."
Homeowners, particularly those buying at today's prices, shouldn't fear for the future of their home value -- but should expect a plateauing of potential increases back down to four or five percent, Bjerke Markgraf said.
"The supply issues that we're having now, they started in 2010," Hackney said. "It's going to take a decade to build us or renovate us out of the issue we're in right now."
I reached out to a buddy in the construction business. Wanted to explore getting a house to flip. He’s been in the business his whole life.
His response: I’d love to, but there are no homes to buy. The corporations are buying up everything as soon as it hits the market.
In the metro Atlanta area you’ll find townhome and attached single family homes in subdivisions going up. All rentals.
Interesting post.
1958 houses tend to have a lot of maintenance requirements as well—though of course that depends on how much of the interior has been renovated over the years.
Let me rephrase your question to "Where are all those aliens pouring across our southern border going to live?"
In Northern California houses in the not so good part of town are being rented to large groups of illegal aliens for insane amounts of money. A 3 bedroom house can house 6 or 7 families. Mattresses on the floors of the garage, living rooms and dining rooms. You can tell where it is going on by driving around on trash pickup day. I put my trash out one night and the can was half full. When I went out to go to work at 6AM it was overflowing from a house (barracks would be more accurate) up the street. Many single family houses are being kept off the market because the owner can make a fortune right now playing this game.
Blackrock is evil.
Very Frank Lloyd Wrightish, to a degree.
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