Anyone who’s been in the market to buy a home in the past year can tell you – there’s very little to choose from and you have to move FAST. The name of the game right now in real estate is inventory, or lack thereof.

Luckily, on a national level, we’re seeing an increase in homes on the market:

Note, “CHPI” is a proprietary measure of asking prices, which continue to go up. In the Charlotte market, prices are up about 15% year over year, and inventory is down a whopping 50%.

The other remarkable thing is the percentage of homes that are off the market within a month:

Nationally, almost half of all homes listed go under contract within a month. In the Charlotte market, we’re above average at about 56% of homes selling within a month. If you have buyers “taking their time,” you’re probably ready to pull your hair out by now. 🙂

No, it’s not a bubble!

One thing to watch out for is the popular notion that we’re in some sort of “bubble.” But as we’ve explained many, many times: this is not a real estate bubble. Yes, inventory will creep up and we might even see a downturn. But people waiting for some sort of massive crash (a-la 2008) will be disappointed. Make sure to educate everyone in your sphere of influence that while yes, this is a challenging market for buyers, it is not a “bubble.”

For those of us who were in the business back in ’09-’10 or so, when we had a year of inventory & homes were often sitting for months, no matter the price, this current market is truly a wild turn of events!

About a year ago, we were entering a scary time. COVID-19 had just emerged in the US and the real estate industry was bracing for the worst. Gloom & doom was everywhere: would buyers still want to buy? What would happen with all the forbearances? Will this be 2008 all over again?

We did tell you that healthy loan profiles and low inventory would make any sort of crash very unlikely. And sure enough, here we are a year later and if anything, the residential housing market is TOO hot.

Inventory is down 45% year over year and asking prices (“CHPI” is a proprietary measure of asking prices of the average American home) are up 15%.

Repeat after me: THERE WILL BE NO ’08-STYLE HOUSING CRASH.

The current industry outlook is off-the-charts high. To have a price downturn of any kind (even a mild one) would take a huge infusion of inventory.

Let’s look locally.

This is what we call an “overheated” housing market. Recipe for massive bidding wars & homes selling way over list price. For every price point under $750k, inventory is 3 months or less. We generally consider 6 months to be “balanced.” Anything below that is a buyer’s market. But below 3 months?! Almost unheard of for an extended period of time.

So, the next time you hear someone talk about a prospective real estate downturn, laugh at them. It’s a very good time to be a home seller, and there is no end in sight.

Thanks to @LoganMohtashami and @housingralph for the data.

If you’re in real estate, you’ve probably been asked about 100 times whether this will be like 2008, when we saw huge amounts of inventory & massive price declines.

As we’ve been trying to tell you for quite some time, the current state of real estate looks nothing like the pre-crash environment in 2007. Loan profiles are healthy and, adjusted for inflation, the values are nowhere near as inflated as they were before the Great Recession.

And would you look at that, home purchase mortgage applications are now up 20% year over year.

Any buyers sitting on the sidelines, fearing some sort of residential real estate calamity, might find themselves regretting that move, and soon. Yes, a lot of what we’re seeing is pent-up demand from March/April, but even if things slow as we get into winter ’20/’21, there’s no reason to believe it’s going to make a big dent in prices.

Remember, you can’t have a real estate downtown without a lot of inventory, and that’s where we are right now.

The disruption to our daily lives from Coronavirus is already having an economic impact. Home buyers & sellers are tapping the brakes, to wait out the projected 2-3 month ordeal.

But the news isn’t all bad. Yes, the next couple months will be tough & the economic impact could hit the real estate market. But as it stands now, inventory in our area is so low that an uptick due to buyers staying home might not be such a bad thing.

There are fewer than 6 months inventory (considered a “balanced” market) in every price bracket under $1M. And below $400k, it’s extremely low – under 4 months.

During the Great Recession, we routinely saw over a year of supply in many price brackets, even lower ones. Plus, that crisis was spawned largely due to exploding home prices & a lot of bad loans. This time around, we haven’t seen either of those things.

Yes, values have gone up, but not in any sort of dramatic spike. And loan profiles are far healthier than they were in 2007.

The takeaway here is similar to what you’ve been hearing a lot lately: don’t panic. Use the next couple months to beef up your website with fresh content. If you don’t want to do it yourself, find a good blogging service.

By summer, with a little luck, things will be much closer to normal and the silver lining is buyers having more homes to choose from.

As more Millennials become home buyers, they are finding that options can be very limited for starter homes, and one of the reasons for this, according to a recent Chicago Tribune story.

A Freddie Mac analysis estimated that Boomers opting to “age in place” rather than downsize are keeping about 1.6 million homes off the market. Another study showed that older homeowners have overtaken middle-aged ones to become the primary source of home improvement spending.

Part of the reason for this is people are living longer, so someone in their late 50s isn’t necessarily ready to move to a retirement community. They instead opt to renovate their existing home to meet their current needs.

While this is great news for the construction industry, it creates challenges for real estate professionals, with most areas in a strong Seller’s market. Low inventory means buyers have to move fast and be prepared to compete for homes & often pay list price (or more).

Here in Mecklenburg County, we’re seeing this very clearly with fewer than 5 months inventory of homes under $400k! In most markets, there’s a “magic number” where inventory jumps upward, and here, that number is well north of $750k. THAT, my friends, is a seller’s market.

The economic crash of 2008 understandably created a lot of jittery people in the real estate industry. And since about 2011, we’ve seen a lot of price appreciation, so some folks are starting to worry that we’re in for another big drop.

But let’s take a step back and look more closely at these numbers. When you adjust them for inflation, they tell a different story.

Now let’s look at it year-over-year:

Feeling better yet? In the run-up prior to the 2008 crash, we saw year-over-year increases over 15%! This time, the highest it got was just over 10% and that was at the beginning of the recovery.

Add that loan profiles are far, FAR healthier than they were in the early 00s, and it gets much harder to fear this market.

To be clear — the price increases we’ve seen due to low inventory will certainly slow a bit, and maybe even turn the other direction, which is a normal market correction. But we’re not in line for any sort of calamity like we saw a decade ago.

Charts from loganmohtashami.com

Those of us who were in the real estate biz in the early 00s remember the craziness with mortgages. Subprimes were riding high and money was far, far too easy (which led to the eventual bust).

But check out the loan profiles over this recent boom:

In sum:

• Subprimes have remained at or below 10% of mortgages (where they peaked around 25% pre-crash).
• Less money is being borrowed overall
• Low credit (under 660) make up less than 2% of loans (down from ~5% pre-crash)

The “TL;DR” from this is that if there is to be a real estate downturn, it will not be due to bad loans or exotic debt structures, as we saw in 2008. If anything, we’ll see a pullback due to a much needed increase in inventory.

2008 (understandably) created some real estate “Chicken Littles” but remember — lightning doesn’t strike twice in the same place. The next “crisis” will most likely not be related to real estate/mortgages.

Did you know over 50 neighborhoods in South Charlotte have fewer than 4 months supply?  And over 100 neighborhoods around Lake Norman!

If you like to farm neighborhoods, now is the time.  Unsure sellers might not be aware just how hot their neighborhood is and we have data for all over Charlotte.

Here are a few examples:

• Birkdale Village (1.7 months supply)
• Raintree (1.9 months supply)
• Montclaire (3.2 months supply)
• Barclay Downs (2.9 months supply)
• Sheffield Park (2.4 months supply)
• Stonegate Farms (1.9 months supply)
• Collins Park (2.5 months supply)

We’ve compiled these handy sortable lists for you:

• South Charlotte
• Ballantyne
• Southpark
• “In-town” area
• Lake Norman
• Cabarrus County
• Union County