April 2020 – Monthly Statistical Update for California

Recession anticipation send rates down, refinances up
+ A negative yield spread forecasts a 2020 recession while FRM rates hit record lows.
+ Fixed Rate Mortgage rates hit record lows
+ Refinances to continue their rise

📭 Carlos.Camargo@BHGhome.com
☎️ (510) 798-5016
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March 2020 | Spring Buying & Selling Season in Full Swing

• Value-Boosting Renovations for Your Home

• Is Downsizing Right for You? 

• Take 5: Reasons to Maintain a Phone-free Bedroom

• 10 First-time Home Buyer Tips

• Your Checklist for Buying a Fixer-Upper

When deciding on offer strategy and price, make sure you’re comparing your potential home

to the right type of properties in the relevant neighborhoods

Stratified real estate markets may sound confusing, but don’t let terms like stratification scare you.  It is simply taking an area like a city or region and dividing it out into similar or equal sections.  For real estate, you can take a city or neighborhood and break it out by the value of houses or specific house types.

The reason you want to do this is to help determine if you are about to enter into a buyers’ market or a sellers’ market.  By looking at your target area in stratified segments, it can help you to make a decision on whether it is time to buy or sell a home, or wait until the market changes to your favor.  Ready to learn more?  Here is how to stratify your area and determine what you should do if you’re looking at buying or selling a home.

What is a Stratified Market in Real Estate?

A stratified market in real estate is when you take a city and divide it into classes based on home value and type.  Because homes in many cities can have drastic differences in price (they can range between $20,000 and $1,000,000+), the buyer base and housing availability for that base can change making it harder to determine when to buy or sell.  The same can be said if you have condos vs. homes for families with kids, and what types of home buyers are moving in and out and at what pace.

To get a stratified market, start by looking at what the value of the home you want to buy or sell is.  Next take a random sampling of houses that match both the price range and type (single family, row houses, condos, beach homes, etc…) and look to see how many are on the market.

Now look to see how long they’ve been on the market, if the prices keep going up, stay steady, or have been getting marked down.  Now you know if the type of property you’re looking to buy is in demand (a sellers’ market), or if there are more for sale then there are home shoppers (a buyers’ market).

Using Stratification To Determine When to Buy or Sell

Once you have the area you want to buy or sell a property in broken out into groups, you can determine if you live in a buyers’ market or sellers’ market like we outlined above  If you are looking to buy a single family home for $250,000, but keep hearing it’s a sellers’ market, check first to see what is actually selling and what isn’t moving much.

It could turn out that there is demand for luxury homes over $750,000 that are on a golf course or the beach.  Within that same area, the homes which are close by the beach but not directly on the water, and that are in your price range may not have moved.  That means the luxury real estate market is for sellers and the regular price range is a buyers’ market.  That is why you may hear one real estate agent say it’s a sellers’ market and another say it’s a buyers’ market.  Both may be true, depending on the real estate market stratification.

By creating stratified groupings, it turns out that the luxury markets are for sellers because you have overseas investors buying them up, wealthy people moving to your area for work, or any number of reasons.  But a nice home that is within your price range, and stratified group, is a prime investment and now is the perfect time to buy.

These types of examples are more common along the coastal cities in Florida, where I grew up,  or California, where I live now, where it is easier for people in other countries to buy properties as investments in the USA and let them sit.  They want the land on the coast where their money can be stable while other people are looking for a place to live that is safe and has desirable amenities like schools, dog parks, and all of the things which would cause someone to want to live there.  But it also occurs in the midwest, the south and other regions of the United States.

If you’re looking to find out whether you should buy or sell, start by using stratification.  Once you have a stratified real estate market, it’ll be easier for you to determine what your next move should be.  Buy or sell a home, or wait for the right time when you can get the best bank for your buck based on your needs.

What you need to know as a seller in a stratified market

Seller’s markets: What they mean for buyers and sellers

If you’re in a seller’s market, then demand outranks supply. There are more buyers on the market than there are listings, and buyers see tough competition for the few homes that are available.

As a buyer, this isn’t the ideal market. You will probably come up against other offers and may find yourself in a bidding war (or several). You also may need to up your offer, waive contingencies, or make other moves to ensure your bids are attractive to sellers. Overall, it may take you longer to find a home that fits within your price range.

As a seller, this is the prime time to sell a home. You might be able to increase your listing price a bit. And as long as your home is in good condition, you can pretty much have your pick of buyers. You can also expect your property to sell fast, and you may be able to avoid some hassles in the process. Waived inspections and all-cash offers are more common in seller’s markets.

Buyer’s markets: What they mean for buyers and sellers

If you’re in a buyer’s market, supply outweighs demand. There are more listings available than there are buyers, and sellers need to work harder to market and offload their homes.

As a buyer, that’s a good thing. You’ll probably have your pick of listings, and you might be able to negotiate more as well. You won’t come up against many bidding wars, either, so you could see a faster, smoother transaction on the whole.

As a seller, conditions aren’t great. Selling in a buyer’s market will probably take a little longer, and you might not get the price you’re hoping for in the end. You’ll need to be willing to negotiate, get creative with your marketing, and maybe even throw in some concessions (like the cost of repairs or new appliances) to motivate the few potential buyers who are out there.

Here’s what the general conditions look
like under each market.

In buyer’s markets:

• There are lots of listings and homes for sale
• Few people are looking to buy a house
• Sellers are more willing to negotiate
• Home prices have dropped or are dropping

In seller’s markets:

• Inventory is low and listings are scarce
• There’s lots of buyer demand and competition
• List prices are rising
• Bidding wars and multiple-offer scenarios are increasing

Coronavirus Impacts on California’s Housing Market

https://www.car.org/knowledge/pubs/newsletters/newsline/coronavirus

The rapid growth of COVID-19 (“Coronavirus”) cases continues to create turbulence in the global economy and in domestic financial markets. However, C.A.R. is not revising its current 2020 housing market forecast, but will continue to monitor the market for negative macroeconomic impacts on the demand for housing as well as the supply chain impacts that could adversely affect the cost of new home construction in the coming months and quarters. C.A.R. has created a list of the Top 10 potential impacts that could elicit questions from buyers and sellers over the near term.

 

1. Forecasts Have Been Downgraded, But Few Economists are Calling for Recession Yet: Last week, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) cut its forecast for global economic growth by 0.1%, but is still calling for an expansion in 2020, albeit at a slower pace. Similar orders of magnitude have been forecast for the domestic economy, with groups like Wells Fargo and others expecting GDP to grow by 10-20 basis points slower than their pre-Coronavirus forecast. Growth is expected to be slower, but the economy is still expected to grow.

   
   

2. Mortgage Rates Will Likely Remain Low, Or Even Fall Further As A Result of Coronavirus: The Federal Reserve issued an emergency 50 basis point cut to their target interest rates, and guidance suggests that the Fed may be open to future reductions in order to counteract the negative impacts to financial markets. This should help to reduce the cost of borrowing and make housing more affordable over the near term, which should help to offset some of the negative impacts to housing demand associated with rising uncertainty.

3. Domestic Buyers May Be Discouraged By Rising Uncertainty and Recession Risk, But Is It Still a Good Time to Buy?: This week, mortgage rates fell to an all-time low level of just 3.13%. That is down from 3.80% at the start of the year and represents significant cost savings over the life of a 30-year loan. For buyers who can afford their monthly payments, the economic uncertainty that is driving rates lower provides an opportunity to capitalize on significantly reduced borrowing costs that they will enjoy for years to come. Short-run risks to the economy exist but are arguably offset by long-run benefits of lower rates at the individual level.

4. Financial Market Volatility Could Reduce Demand For Luxury Homes, But Also Create Potential Opportunities for Luxury Home Buyers: The recent turbulence in financial markets has already impacted household wealth. This could reduce demand for luxury homes in California in particular. However, with less luxury buyers, there could be opportunities for price discounts for buyers who choose to remain in the market for high-end properties. Real estate may also act as a buffer against potentially larger declines in the financial markets.

5. Demand From Foreign Home Buyers Could Be Curtailed Over the Near Term: Reduced economic growth in China, specifically, could stifle demand for California real estate this year. However, foreign buyers represented just 3.9% of California’s home sales last year, so the impacts statewide will be muted compared to 6 years ago, when foreign buyers represented 8.0% of the market. In addition, because domestic buyers typically finance their homes in much larger proportions to their foreign counterparts, low rates could stimulate more domestic demand that would help to offset the impact to foreign buyer demand.

6. Foreign Home Sellers May Face Closing Delays: Because the Embassy and many consulates are closed or may have limited hours in China, and elsewhere, there may be difficulty in providing a properly notarized deed to the property that escrow will accept and title will insure.Advise sellers to make efforts to obtain the deed early in the transaction. If sellers are currently in the U.S., make efforts to comply before returning to their foreign home country. If contract has not been accepted, foreign sellers might want to consider a contingency allowing a seller to cancel if they are unable to obtain notarized deed.

7. New Home Construction in California Could Slow Further, Exacerbating Already-Tight Supply: Many of the inputs to California’s Building Industry are sourced from Asian countries including China. As the Coronavirus disrupts these supply chains, the cost of those materials may increase over the short run or become limited, which will increase the cost of construction and potentially reduce the pace of new residential development below its already-lackluster pace in 2020.

   
   

8. Low Rates and Fewer New Homes Constructed Should Place Upward Pressure on Home Prices: Improved affordability stemming from lower rates combined with fewer new homes being constructed as the construction supply chain is impacted could lead to more upward pressure on home prices in California. Unsold inventory is already at low levels, and reduced construction activity means that is likely to continue—especially if buyers respond to lower rates.

9. Offsetting Effects Leave C.A.R.’s Housing Market Outlook Unchanged, For Now: The situation remains fluid, and conditions could deteriorate beyond what is currently envisioned depending on the severity and duration of the outbreak, but if current economic forecasts of modest declines in GDP growth are realized, the effects of lower rates should help to offset the effects of a slower economy and increased economic uncertainty such that California would still achieve a modest improvement in both home sales and prices this year.

10. Eventual Rebound Will Take Longer Than It Did With SARS in 2000: At the turn of the century, the negative impact of the SARS virus began to fade within 6 months of the outbreak coming under control. However, unlike with the Coronavirus, SARS did not have significant impacts on either consumer spending or domestic financial markets. The size of the impacted population and the death toll is also much larger with Coronavirus, which suggests that the eventual recovery will play out over a longer period of time.

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It’s clear that the Coronavirus will have an impact on the economy and the housing market in 2020, but it is also clear that it is not time to panic. The effect of lower rates will help to offset some of the headwinds in the housing market, and forecasts of economic growth by C.A.R. and others have been revised down, but only by 10s of basis points—not hundreds. The situation remains fluid and the California Association of REALTORS® will be monitoring this situation closely and providing updates as information comes to the fore.

Slowing sales and unmet housing demand | carlosfcamargo.net

+ California home sales volume down slightly in 2019;

+ Home prices level off going into 2020; &

+ Construction declines in 2019, despite rising demand

Let’s conquer East Bay Real Estate Together!

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The Real Estate Advisor: February 2020 | carlosfcamargo.net

+ The Difference Between Home Warranty & Home Insurance
+ Prep Your Pets for the Big Move
+ Take 5: How to Get Ready for Retirement
+ Down Payment Myths Debunked

Ready to find “the one”? I can help you find the home of your dreams. Message me to get started.

LET’S CONQUER EAST BAY REAL ESTATE TOGETHER!

📭Carlos.Camargo@BHGhome.com
🦸‍♂️ #REALTOR® CalDRE #01988431
☎️ (510) 798-5016
#BHGReliancePartners 🏠
#BUY carlosfcamargo.net 🔑
#SELL carlosfcamargo.com 💰
__________
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