We’re about a month into the 2nd quarter of 2016, so it’s safe to start drawing some conclusions the market.  Let’s dive in…

Overall, prices are slightly up.  Uptown condos have seen a bit of a dip, along with homes in Cabarrus county. The average South Charlotte home is now about $430k, 5% up from last year.  Because the region has very low inventory (about 4 months in Charlotte), buyers are paying a premium for desirable properties.

But the other side of the coin of low inventory is lower activity:

A few more uptown condos are selling each month compared to 2015, but overall, activity is down about 15% in the region as a whole.

This number should improve as we get through the summer months, but we expect activity to be down in 2016 due to the lack of local inventory across the board and the dip in home ownership we’ve seen over the past few years.  US home ownership peaked at almost 70% before the economic collapse and has been falling.  It’s down to about 63% today.

While low inventory can cause headaches for buyers, we aren’t seeing big spikes in prices or anything too alarming.  At 4.5 months, we are definitely in a seller’s market, but it’s nothing like what we saw pre-crash.  In a sense, fewer buyers looking is a good thing because it keeps the market more in balance.