Keeping It REAL - by Bettsy Tyler

 It's Anybody's Guess But...  With 10 years having now passed since the Great Recession, the U.S. has been on the longest period of continued economic expansion on record. The housing market has been along for much of the ride and continues to benefit greatly from the overall health of the economy. However, hot economies eventually cool and with that, hot housing markets move more towards balance. Housing market forecasts are essentially informed guesses based on existing patterns, and there are plenty of guesses going around, While the real estate pace of 2021 appears to be reverting to seasonality as we approached 2022, demand is not waning. Increasing interest rates will almost certainly have a greater impact on the national housing market as we move into 2022 than any other factor. Sellers remain in an advantageous position as long as the inventory remains at or near its current level. Housing supply is and will likely remain a challenge for some time as labor and mate...

"2020 will be known for a lot of things, and a record-breaking year for real estate will certainly be one of its more unexpected legacies,” prominent economist Daryl Fairweather said. 1 And he’s right: most of us would have expected the housing market to suffer from circumstances like a once-in-a-hundred-years pandemic and historic inventory shortages. But, rather than a slowdown, we are continuing to experience a surprisingly robust real estate market across the country and locally. Experts estimate that these conditions are likely to last well into the new year. Fannie Mae Senior VP and Chief Economist Doug Duncan predicts that existing home sales will ultimately “be up a percent or more in 2021.” He believes home prices will continue to rise due to limited inventory, but he is confident the Federal Reserve will keep interest rates low into the future, which will be “very good for households.” 2 Market conditions like fewer available listings, changing criteria for desired ...

Santa Cruz County Real Estate Sales - How do things compare to last year? Listings began to climb starting in February last year, a little earlier than usual, and reach almost 400 in April. April through September of last year (2019) there was an average of 350 new listings each month. Sales numbered about 240/month April through September. This year began stronger than last with February recording 340 new listings. Come March, however, new listings dropped to 278 and in April to 236. Sales dropped as well. Though it’s too early yet to see the Covid-19 effect, sales are definitely lower than last year at this time averaging about 160/month for March and April.  Having fewer new listings, it’s only natural to expect fewer sales. Taking a look at Months of Inventory is another way to measure what’s happening. Months of Inventory is a measure of how fast all the existing homes on the market would last assuming a) no more listings are added, and b) the rate...