What is going on in the Real Estate market?! It's nuts here!!!!!

[pinkjewel]

I am baffled. we are in the middle of a pandemic, the unemployment rate is rising, and people are buying up real estate like crazy. In North Carolina it's gotten to be a feeding frenzy. Multiple bids as soon as housing comes on the market. Houses that I've seen languishing for years on the market now sold. I'm speaking mainly about our coastal area, but still seeing very brisk sales in central NC, too. What's going on in your states? Is this everywhere, or has everyone suddenly decided they need to live in North Carolina, and more specifically at our coast?

 

[YadaYadaYada]

There has been a big boom in CT especially shoreline property. The uptick is being attributed to the folks that left or are leaving NY.

 

[kenny]

Thank C19 that more people have been stuck in their houses forever!
I wonder if this results in more people being more bothered by things they don't like about their houses.
Hence the moving bug.

Just guessing.

 

[AprilBaby]

It’s quiet here in suburban Chicago.

 

[kenny]

I don't pay much attention, but Googling reveals prices near me are up slightly, but volume of sales has dropped a lot.

Weird.

 

[pinkjewel]

Kenny, maybe less inventory has pushed prices up, but could also lead to less sales

 

[pinkjewel]

There has been a big boom in CT especially shoreline property. The uptick is being attributed to the folks that left or are leaving NY.

So, maybe everyone has decided with the new norm of being able to work from home, or possibly taking early retirement, they will just move to coastal areas or other areas that they prefer.

 

[Slickk]

Our market is hot. I am in the NYC suburbs and the reasoning here is that quarantining has convinced the city dwellers that they need more open space. Good for me, not so good for my millennial children who are looking to get into the market.

 

[RunningwithScissors]

Mortgage interest rates are at an all time low. So for people who still have job security and/or money in the bank it is a good time to purchase and/or refinance.

 

[Musia]

So, maybe everyone has decided with the new norm of being able to work from home, or possibly taking early retirement, they will just move to coastal areas or other areas that they prefer.

We spent 3.5 years in Raleigh, they were our happies years in the USA. I am dreaming of coming back to NC and agree to live farther from the coastal area if everything there is going to be sold by the time of my husband's retirement. However people who are buying houses on a coast may be not aware of the powers of hurricanes

 

[Matata]

Right before the pandemic, we had low inventory and high demand and that condition persists. Houses in my neighborhood are selling for $200,000+ more than they were listed for pre-pandemic and few of them have been updated since they were built in the 1980s. Most buyers are from the area with a few coming from other parts of the state. There are a lot of contractors working in the neighborhood updating the interiors of the houses that have been sold.

 

[pinkjewel]

We spent 3.5 years in Raleigh, they were our happies years in the USA. I am dreaming of coming back to NC and agree to live farther from the coastal area if everything there is going to be sold by the time of my husband's retirement. However people who are buying houses on a coast may be not aware of the powers of hurricanes

LOL- there will always be coastal homes available. People move here from other places and don't realize that for 4 months of the year it's so hot and muggy that it's like living in a ziplock bag-haha. Add to that they are building on every square inch of land the developers can find and there will be plenty of homes. Same thing in the triangle area. Building is booming and Raleigh suburbs are spreading in every direction. Traffic was getting to be a nightmare before Covid, but now with so many people working from home and no school it's actually become much more manageable. Unfortunately, I never want to drive anywhere to take advantage of that!!!

 

[Tekate]

Austin,Texas is booming.

 

[Karl_K]

Lack of rental units is pushing apartment prices way up.
Buyers market for many house categories others are getting multi-offers and gone in 5-6 days.

 

[DauphineMucha]

Maybe this...?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2020/06/01/city-relocate-pandemic/

 

[ItsMainelyYou]

There is definitely movement coming up from the varied metropolises into more rural northern New England.

 

[missy]

A house sold on our block this month at the beach an unprecedented price per square foot. It superseded the price per square foot in NYC which was already expensive IMO. It was on the market for less than a week I think. When they put it on the market at that price I said to Greg have they lost their minds? Turns out no, they knew what they were doing. As long as they have another place to go.

I think people want to leave the cities and are willing to pay top dollar and beyond to do so. Those that can afford to do so.

We are located only about 40 minutes from the city so perhaps the best of both worlds. Though I will add the beaches here have never been more crowded and right now I wish we lived somewhere the beaches were quieter.

 

[Daisys and Diamonds]

So much for the predictions lockdown that the real estate bubble would burst
Pity the people trying to get a foot on the property ladder or people who are non professionals
Its been really bad here for years
that's why we moved to wanganui which is almost the stix
...now if i could just find a job

 

[missy]

So much for the predictions lockdown that the real estate bubble would burst
Pity the people trying to get a foot on the property ladder or people who are non professionals
Its been really bad here for years
that's why we moved to wanganui which is almost the stix
...now if i could just find a job

I think it depends where one is looking/lives. The RE markets in cities are not doing as well as those outside the cities for now. Pandemic related. So it is the reverse of what is the usual rule of thumb. That homes appreciate faster in cities. However these are unprecedented times and I have a feeling that once this is over and things resume "normally" the RE market will, eventually bounce back in the cities. Of course I could be completely wrong. Only time will tell.

I hope you find a great job Daisy and I hope one day you can find the home of your dreams exactly where you want to be. XOXO.

 

[missy]

Just googled it and here ya go.

Real Estate Prices Fall Sharply in New York (Published 2020)

Since the coronavirus shut the city down, the number of sales in Manhattan dropped 54 percent and the median price fell to $1 million.

www.nytimes.com

"
Since the coronavirus shut the city down, the number of sales in Manhattan dropped 54 percent and the median price fell to $1 million.

After three months with brokers prohibited from in-person showings, many buyers and sellers are just starting to get back in the market.Credit...Karsten Moran for The New York Times
By Stefanos Chen and Sydney Franklin

• Published July 2, 2020Updated July 6, 2020

The coronavirus has dealt a blow to the Manhattan real estate market unmatched in recent history, and the prospects of a near-term recovery remain unclear.
The number of closed sales in the second quarter was down 54 percent compared to the same period last year, the largest decline in at least 30 years, according to a new report from the brokerage Douglas Elliman. The median sales price fell 17.7 percent, compared to the same time last year, to $1 million, the biggest drop in a decade.
The number of contracts signed for apartments in June, the latest indicator of buyer appetite, was down 76 percent, compared to the same time last year.
“This is what you get when the market is not able to function,” said Jonathan Miller, a New York appraiser and the author of the report, noting that in-person apartment showings in New York City were banned for nearly the entire quarter. “It’s an extreme moment, to put it lightly.”



Even after a full quarter of sales data in the midst of the pandemic, outlining the shape of an eventual recovery is difficult. More than 90 percent of the sales recorded in the second quarter were actually signed before the virus gripped New York in March, said Bess Freedman, the chief executive of the brokerage Brown Harris Stevens.

Updated 1h ago



Pent-up demand, from buyers who were unable to view apartments before the city started to reopen, is likely to fuel sales in the next quarter, and home sellers seem to agree. Last week, 550 new listings hit the market, nearly twice as many as in the same week last year, according to UrbanDigs, a real estate data firm. But overall, listings in Manhattan are still down 26 percent compared to last year, the first year-over-year drop in inventory in five years, according to the Corcoran Group.
“I’d like to say it dropped because we sold it all, but that’s not the reality,” said Pamela Liebman, the chief executive of Corcoran, noting that many sellers pulled their homes off the market because of the shutdown.
Despite the significant drop in sales price in the quarter, more time is needed to make sense of the sharp decline. “There are plenty of examples of discounts, and just as many without,” said Mr. Miller, who notes that the market is only now entering a stage resembling normalcy.

One of the looming questions heading into the third quarter is how the pandemic will shift buyer preferences. There has been a spike in search traffic for apartments with outdoor spaces and home offices, said Rory Golod, the regional president of the brokerage Compass.


“People are more attracted to a property that no one has ever lived in before,” said Steve Kliegerman, the president of Brown Harris Stevens Development Marketing, adding that the shift could be a boon for the new development market. That is not yet the case, though. Just 98 contracts on newly built apartments were signed or closed from mid-March to mid-June, a 75 percent drop from the same period last year, according to a report from his firm.
Several agents have said that units in larger buildings have been a particularly hard sell, because of concerns over crowded elevators and shared lobbies. And even though state guidelines no longer prohibit in-person showings, some buildings have not relaxed their rules and are still refusing to allow move-ins or apartment showings.
There may be more lasting changes in the months to come. The share of all-cash buyers dropped to 41 percent, down from an average of about 50 percent over the last several years, Mr. Miller said. That could have major implications for the luxury market, which had been propped up by investment buyers who typically bought without financing.
The market may return to some semblance of normal by the first quarter of 2021, said Garrett Derderian, the chief executive of GS Data Services, a real estate analytics firm. But that will depend not only on whether the city experiences another wave of infections, but also on whether the state decides to raise income taxes to shore up pandemic-related budget shortfalls."




And

Families fleeing the city are pushing up home prices amid tight supply

A buyer from New York City saw a home via virtual tour, then three hours later offered the full asking price, in cash, one realtor said.

www.nbcnews.com

 

[Elizabeth35]

I am in suburban Chicago--out in low-density unincorporated area.
Our realtor is seeing lots of people fleeing Chicago for larger properties due to Covid.
Less congested and larger homes and lots are desired for quarantine and WFH.

It is driving vacation home rental prices up---we were trying to find a remote lakefront cabin to rent to get a change of scenery. Prices in Northern Wisconsin were shocking.

 

[Mekp]

Apparently housing prices in my area are up 10% right now! My mom's neighbour put his house up for sale and sold it for over asking price within 24 hours.
I'm really glad we are staying put.

 

[jordyonbass]

Same here in Melbourne, my wife and I are trying to buy land and build but every time we find land it keeps getting snatched out from underneath us. We were absolutely gobsmacked when we realised that there's more people in the buying market than the rental market here.

 

[diamondringlover]

I am in Ohio and houses in my area sell almost as soon as they go on the market...its nuts in my neck of the woods, however this has been going on for a couple of years in my area and covid doesnt seem to be slowing anything down and the prices are going up, up, up!

 

[Tekate]

Last November we put our house in multiple listing on a Friday nite, open house Sunday, two offers, one 5K over and the other 10K over, this was in Scarborough, ME in Cumberland County, I thought no one would buy it in November..

There is definitely movement coming up from the varied metropolises into more rural northern New England.

 

[Maria D]

Last November we put our house in multiple listing on a Friday nite, open house Sunday, two offers, one 5K over and the other 10K over, this was in Scarborough, ME in Cumberland County, I thought no one would buy it in November..

I did not know you were another Mainer @Bayek...that is, if you didn't move away after selling your house.

Things are nutso here in Portland. I couldn't believe what people were paying for downtown condos the last few years; always thought that it must be investments by rich out-of-towners. But now it's looking like bidding wars are the norm everywhere in the city and beyond.

 

[ItsMainelyYou]

Last November we put our house in multiple listing on a Friday nite, open house Sunday, two offers, one 5K over and the other 10K over, this was in Scarborough, ME in Cumberland County, I thought no one would buy it in November..

I did not know you were another Mainer @Bayek...that is, if you didn't move away after selling your house.

Things are nutso here in Portland. I couldn't believe what people were paying for downtown condos the last few years; always thought that it must be investments by rich out-of-towners. But now it's looking like bidding wars are the norm everywhere in the city and beyond.

@Bayek @Maria D Now I know why I like you two Maniacs
We were practically neighbors, then.
One very old Federal period house near mine(4500/5000sq), that needed a complete rehab(no plumbing/wiring/floors left/roof/horsehair plaster/septic everything) but good bones- went for 300k this spring- for the shell. They basically bought for the land. That's at least 100k over what it should have sold for, not being on an actual lake. In the sticks.

 

[missy]

This is timely. And fascinating.

East Coasters Are Snapping Up Vacation Homes Amid Coronavirus

Sales in resort and rural areas are surging as home buyers look for getaways from Covid.

www.wsj.com

"
East Coasters Are Snapping Up Vacation Homes Amid Coronavirus
Sales in resort and rural areas are surging as home buyers look for getaways from Covid


By
Candace Taylor
July 16, 2020 12:10 pm ET

When Covid-19 struck New York City in March, Jessica and Matthew Perkal were among the many Manhattan residents who decided to wait out the pandemic in a more rural setting. Ms. Perkal, who is pregnant with the couple’s second child, and her husband left their West Village apartment for Kiawah, a South Carolina barrier island where they had frequently vacationed with Ms. Perkal’s family. “We thought, ‘let’s go somewhere we enjoy,’” said Ms. Perkal, who is originally from Charlotte, N.C.
At first they rented on Kiawah, enjoying the “big wide beach” and biking with their daughter, Charlie. But as the pandemic dragged on, they started looking at houses for sale. They found a house they loved and bought it for $2 million, records show, moving in about a month ago. Once the pandemic is over they plan to return to New York City, Ms. Perkal said, using their new beach house for summer vacations and weekends.
Buying a Kiawah home was something they had always wanted to do. “The pandemic was an impetus for things we were already thinking about,” Ms. Perkal said.

The Scriven family’s newly purchased home at Serenbe in Georgia.
PHOTO: DEBORAH WHITLAW LLEWELLYN FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

Tyler Scriven, his wife Faith McCoy Scriven, and their 5-year-old son Patterson.
PHOTO: DEBORAH WHITLAW LLEWELLYN FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS
Have you considered buying a vacation home during the pandemic?
Second-home sales in resort and rural communities have seen a surprising surge in recent months. On Kiawah, for example, local real-estate firm Kiawah Island Real Estate said it put 72 properties under contract in June, more than quadruple the number in June of last year. Unlike the West Coast, where a home sales boom is being fed by buyers relocating permanently, or buying homes to use for long-term staycations, many residents of East Coast metro areas are snatching up vacation homes as family escapes from whatever the pandemic brings next.


Despite predictions that the pandemic would drive wealthy eastern urbanites to abandon cities, many of these buyers aren’t giving up their primary homes, but rather acting on a longtime desire for a town-and-country lifestyle.
Buyers are “reassessing how they’re going on vacation and spending their time,” said Paul Grover, a real-estate agent on Cape Cod, a popular vacation destination on the Massachusetts coast. He said homes there are getting multiple offers and selling within a day or hours of hitting the market, a phenomenon previously unheard of in the area’s generally unhurried market. “This is the strongest I’ve ever seen it,” he said. “Having a house on the water or close to the water gives them the ability to be away without getting on a plane.”
Second Home’s a Charm
Homebuyers on the East Coast are scooping up vacation properties to escape the pandemic.


He said most of these buyers—many from the Boston area—are keeping their primary homes. “For people in the city, the pandemic has opened their eyes to the fact that as great as it is to be in the city, it’s good to have something else in situations that maybe nobody had thought of before.”
In the rural Hudson Valley north of New York City, home prices have increased 10% to 20% in the last three months, with homes selling after less than 24 hours on the market, according to Colin Brice, an architect and real-estate developer in the area. “When the pandemic hit, people were like ‘I need to get out of here, at least for the summer,’” said Mr. Brice. For urbanites, he said, “the pandemic was a wake-up call that ‘I need a place to go just in case.’”
This is a sudden reversal of fortune for some markets that had struggled before the virus. The real-estate market in Connecticut, for example, was “sort of slumbering,” before the pandemic, said Annette Coplit, a real-estate agent in the coastal town of Westport, Conn., a popular weekend-home destination for New Yorkers. But since the pandemic started, she said she’s seeing bidding wars and people paying over the asking price.

The Kiawah home of the Perkal family.
PHOTO: KATIE CHARLOTTE FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

Jessica and Matthew Perkal and their daughter, Charlie.
PHOTO: KATIE CHARLOTTE FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

“I’ve been in the business for 30 years, and I’ve never seen a market like this,” she said. “Even at the peak in 2005 we didn’t have this kind of demand.”
In Connecticut’s rural Litchfield County, 13 listings priced from $1 million to $5 million sold in May, more than double the number in the same period of last year, according to Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices New England Properties. In Dutchess County in the Hudson Valley, the average home price jumped to $393,571 in June, 14% higher than the same month of last year, according to the brokerage Houlihan Lawrence. In the Hamptons, the number of new contracts signed in June leapt 88.5% from the same month last year, while Long Island’s North Fork increased 29.2%, according to a Douglas Elliman market report prepared by Miller Samuel. By contrast, the number of new contracts signed on the rest of Long Island fell 8.4% during the same period.

Floridians Gretchen and Chad Rich take their five children on ski vacations in the Rocky Mountains every year. And while the Pensacola family had long dreamed of buying a ski house of their own, they never thought they would do it anytime soon, Mr. Rich said, until Covid-19 came along. In June, they paid $760,000 for a cabin on 2.5 wooded acres in Jackson Hole.

The cabin Gretchen and Chad Rich purchased in Jackson Hole.
PHOTO: LATHAM JENKINS
“It was always one of those things, like ‘wouldn’t it be nice?” said Mr. Rich, 50, an executive at OneDigital Health and Benefits. But when the pandemic struck, “we wanted a safe, less-populated place for vacation, a place to run to that makes our family happy.”
New Yorkers Roxanna Namavar and Shamim Ahmed had been casually looking for a Hamptons home when Covid-19 struck. “We were going to buy something anyway,” said Dr. Namavar, a physician and founder of Pretty Healthy NYC. “It just sped up the timeline.”

Gretchen and Chad Rich, who live primarily in Florida and plan to use their Jackson Hole cabin a few times a year for vacations.
PHOTO: LATHAM JENKINS
They found a house with a pool in East Hampton, which they liked for its high ceilings and because it was newly renovated, meaning they could move in right away. They made an offer for just under the asking price, beating out several other bidders. Since closing on the house in late May for $1.65 million, they have been living there full-time with their young son. Dr. Namavar said they expect to return to New York City once she can resume seeing patients in her Manhattan office.
With timelines uncertain for returning to school and offices, many vacation-home buyers are seeking out properties that can double as full-time homes if necessary. Atlanta residents Tyler Scriven and his wife Faith McCoy Scriven were already in the process of looking for a weekend home when the pandemic hit. They had decided on the wellness community of Serenbe about 45 minutes outside Atlanta, Mr. Scriven said, and had their eye on an under-construction house there. But with the onset of coronavirus they changed course, choosing a larger, four-bedroom house that could potentially become their primary home, and that was already completed so they could start using it right away. They paid $770,000 for the home in early May, and have been spending weekends there with their 5-year-old son Patterson.

“It’s very nice to be able to have somewhere to go at this moment in time,” said Mr. Scriven, co-founder of the Atlanta-based warehousing startup Saltbox. “We’re probably not going to get on a plane for vacation anytime in the near future. So having this sort of outlet is really a game-changer for us.”
Low interest rates are another factor for many vacation-home buyers, including Luke and Johanna Siegel, Manhattan residents who recently went into contract on a country home in Dutchess County, north of the city. “We’re in the race to get our mortgage while the rate is still where it is,” said Mr. Siegel.

Luke and Johanna Siegel.
PHOTO: KAREN PEARSON FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

The Siegels are in contract on this home in the Hudson Valley.
PHOTO: KAREN PEARSON FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
The Siegels faced a lot of competition for their home. They saw it the day after it appeared on Zillow; the next day there were nine other showings. “It was a madhouse,” he said. After beating out several other bidders, they are in contract for $517,000; the house had been listed for $485,000.
Mr. Siegel’s business, the interior space divider company Raydoor, is based in New York City, and the couple’s primary home is a live-work space in Hudson Yards. They plan to split their time between Manhattan and their new house, which sits on 30 acres with a barn. It is something they have thought about for years, but the pandemic made it feel more urgent, he said.
“If you’re on some kind of fence,” Mr. Siegel said, “Covid shoves you off of it.”
"

 

[pinkjewel]

Interesting article, Missy! And, pretty much seems to be what we are seeing. Money does not seem to be an object for many of the people looking for second homes. What is ironic is that they are buying these homes to get away from Covid, but in reality they have brought it with them. Cases in our county are up 645% in the last month...

 

[Dancing Fire]

There has been a big boom in CT especially shoreline property. The uptick is being attributed to the folks that left or are leaving NY.

More people are moving away from the "lawless" cities into the suburbs.