Sellers Show Signs of Entering The Market
The real estate market currently poses some difficulty for buyers to find enough available homes for purchase as the supply has not been keeping up with the strong demand. However, per a recent report issued by Realtor.com, signs are signaling that sellers are slowly starting to return to the market.
Javier Vivas, Director of Economic Research at Realtor.com states: “Seller confidence has been improving gradually after reaching its bottom in mid-April, and now it appears to have reached an important recovery milestone…After five long months, sellers are back in the housing market; while encouraging, the improvement to new listings is only the first step in the long road to solving low inventory issues keeping many buyers at bay.”
Despite more homes starting to be listed for sale the inventory levels are still far below where we need to see them to satisfy buyer demand. Available housing is good for roughly 4 months at the current sales pace but ideally we would need enough for 6 months for things to be in a normal market balance. The National Association of Realtors (NAR) explains:
“Total housing inventory at the end of June totaled 1.57 million units, up 1.3% from May, but still down 18.2% from one year ago (1.92 million). Unsold inventory sits at a 4.0-month supply at the current sales pace, down from both 4.8 months in May and from the 4.3-month figure recorded in June 2019.”
For sellers, now can be a prime time for them to get into the market as chances are that competition in the area is still relatively low. Most homeowners will not want to wait until more sellers list when there will be more abundant options and in many regions the fall market can be a time when activity increases.
For buyers, the trend of more inventory coming in is encouraging as there will be more to choose from in their searches. Historically low mortgage rates persist at record low levels which makes now a great time to make a home purchase.
Ultimately housing inventory still needs to improve to meet buyer demand but we see things moving in the right direction. For anybody thinking about a move in the near future, now is a good time to reach out to your real estate professionals and discuss your plans.
