NFR How's the housing market where you live?

Non-fishing related
swimmy said:
Here in Bozeman it is silly. We own a couple of properties and very grateful. However we are looking to sell our primary residence and buy a new place.

As of Jan 5, median cost of home was $782,500.

We found a house we liked last Friday, made an offer $80k over asking, they had 15 offers in 48 hrs, and we weren't even top 5. Hopefully someone that was in more need than us got it. We will continue to look.

How are things in your hood?
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Same going on here in Utah , bidding I have heard 50-100K over asking . Example of prices ,built my present house in 1999, moved in, in 2000. Cost me 288K . Today market appraisal 950K, wouldn't surprise me if I were to sell to see it go for a million , or possibly more .
 
I lived in a shed for a few years in Seattle while renovating our 800 sf home, which was a neglected POS. Everbody at my office job in DT seattle said I was crazy. Sold it, came out on top.

Before we sold, we bought a home in Sequim that nobody wanted and was on the market forever... not move-in-ready I heard... we've been living there 4 yrs and slowly bringer back. It's at least doubled in value and it's not fully renovated. Wont cash in cause we're where we want to be, but every neighbor told us we over paid and they all had friends that looked and passed.

Do what others wont and there's a chance.
 
Blackrock, the worlds largest asset manager, has been ripping through urban areas all over the world, buying every single single family residence they can find, paying 20-50% above asking price and outbidding 'normal' home buyers, joined by corporations, pension funds and property investment groups doing the same. SF Bay Area and the Seattle Metro prime targets.
Simple driver behind this...negligible interest return on bank notes vs 20% run-up on apprecation makes it a no-brainer for cash flush entities. And then add in the techies whose financial advisors have been telling them to sell some of their corporate stock award holdings at record levels and use those funds to diversify into real estate rentals. All creating the most agressive real estate run-up possible.
Next add in those with the ability to work remotely who are moving to non-hub cities and towns where they often pay cash over asking for homes, driving up prices so local first time home buyers can't afford to buy.
If young enough and don't see a clear path forward where you are, good time to consider a transplant to where you can.
 
up2nogood said:
Same going on here in Utah , bidding I have heard 50-100K over asking . Example of prices ,built my present house in 1999, moved in, in 2000. Cost me 288K . Today market appraisal 950K, wouldn't surprise me if I were to sell to see it go for a million , or possibly more .
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When you view purchasing a house as investment, that increase in value is not that far out of line. Returns in the S&P 100 overall have doubled every 6-7 years (albeit with some big ups and big downs. Volatility = risk). Real estate returns are more variable and depend substantially on the local market (far more variable across the country). So, if you purchased your house in 2000 for $288K and if the market doubled, it would have been worth $576K in 2010 and $1.15M in 2020. The WA state Office of Financial Management has a web page listing the median home cost in WA from 2000 ($176,300) to 2020 ($452,400). That comes out as a 12% yearly increase. And it does not include substantial regional variation between say Seattle/Bellevue and more rural parts of the state. It is a very challenging to begin the process of jumping into the housing market.
Steve
 
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Cabezon said:
When you view purchasing a house as investment, that increase in value is not that far out of line. Returns in the S&P 100 overall have doubled every 6-7 years (albeit with some big ups and big downs. Volatility = risk). Real estate returns are more variable and depend substantially on the local market (far more variable across the country). So, if you purchased your house in 2000 for $288K and if the market doubled, it would have been worth $576K in 2010 and $1.15M in 2020. The WA state Office of Financial Management has a web page listing the median home cost in WA from 2000 ($176,300) to 2020 ($452,400). That comes out as a 12% yearly increase. And it does not include substantial regional variation between say Seattle/Bellevue and more rural parts of the state. It is a very challenging market to begin the process of jumping into the housing market.
Steve
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I look back. Previous home bought in 1976 ,39,700. sold in 1999 for 156,000, Yup doubled every 10 years .
 
Located in Big Sky, MT. We purchased our home in 2019 and it has more then doubled in value In the last 3 years. I’m glad we bought when we did because we would be priced out if we were to buy in todays market.

I’ve seen multiple homes in the area that are going sight unseen, cash offer, over listing, and most likely sold within one day. The scary part is that seems to be the new norm..
 
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Stonedfish said:
This listing popped up in one of my news feeds.
Listed 2/17
Three hour open house 2/20
Sellers will review offers by 2/21
That is creating some serious urgency. Nice house by the way in a very desirable area.
SF

thomasfoy.johnlscott.com

Kirkland Area Residential

Exceptional NW Contemporary Home boasts clean lines and a fantastic floor plan. The elevated entrance greets you with natural light, soaring ceilings and walls of windows. A custom grand staircase, gleaming engineered hardwoods and designer finishes make an instant impression. Chefs kitchen...
thomasfoy.johnlscott.com thomasfoy.johnlscott.com
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A listing in Ballard popped up yesterday for $1.499 mil with no offer review date. It was pending by early afternoon and went so fast that the MLS still showed days on the market as zero.
 
_WW_ said:
And I would add, Do it while you are young. Putting in a full day doing construction work gets tougher the closer you get to 70.
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Ain't that the truth!!! When I retired I sold all my shop tools (toys) e.g. table saw, drill press, planer, large router, etc. I was fortunate to keep my air tools. I announced I Am Done! We will pay for anything that needs to be done. Two years later the missus wanted the Master remodeled. Got bids. I was back at it without all the toys and on third floor of our house. Sheetrock, granite, lumber, 3 floors and old age is insanity!
 
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Because of the stratospheric home prices in Seattle, people thought they'd move to Tacoma and commute to save money. Of course now T-town has gone crazy with high prices and caused people there, wanting a new home to move to Lacey, Yelm or Olympia. Lacey especially is booming as the city seems to promote heavy grow in residential and commercial. No. Thurston county, being closest to the urban Sea/Tac and JBLM is the fastest growing. Two houses in my neighborhood, NE Oly, went up for sale last month with prices I thought bordered on gouging. To my amazement they both sold in less than a week for over the asking price. Looks like people will be headed to Centralia next as the housing shockwave continues to expand....The starter house we bought in 1978 on the Sammamish Plateau for $35k just sold for a cool $1,000,000 last week...
 
Wetswinger said:
Because of the stratospheric home prices in Seattle, people thought they'd move to Tacoma and commute to save money. Of course now T-town has gone crazy with high prices and caused people there, wanting a new home to move to Lacey, Yelm or Olympia. Lacey especially is booming as the city seems to promote heavy grow in residential and commercial. No. Thurston county, being closest to the urban Sea/Tac and JBLM is the fastest growing. Two houses in my neighborhood, NE Oly, went up for sale last month with prices I thought bordered on gouging. To my amazement they both sold in less than a week for over the asking price. Looks like people will be headed to Centralia next as the housing shockwave continues to expand....The starter house we bought in 1978 on the Sammamish Plateau for $35k just sold for a cool $1,000,000 last week...
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I'm hoping to move to your neighborhood from Tacoma, and part of that is to escape Tacoma prices. I no longer have to commute daily so being as close to home isn't as necessary, but even in those other places, the price of a starter home has skyrocketed even when there aren't any jobs to support living in any of those starter homes. One of the prime motivators for us is just to have a backyard so my kids don't break everything I own in my house and to think about what options we have for school for both of them. We definitely are not looking for something crazy, but my wife is just about to go back to school because we can't make it work on a single income + part-time income anymore.

Here the latest from the NYTimes on how its hitting Spokane.
 
JayB said:
"If something can't go on forever, it won't" ~ Herb Stein
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I guess the real question is whether this housing situation is a bubble, and how the long term demographic shifts will impact its sustainability. The long term property tax implications are also staggering.

It's easy to visualize a great many homeowners making use of rapidly escalating equity value for any number of depreciating consumptive purposes, and then finding themselves deeply under-water.

At the other end of the home buying age spectrum, as equity loaded boomers attempt to downsize, they rapidly drive up the prices of what once were starter homes. I've several retired neighbors who've simply decided to stay in their large homes since downsizing to a much smaller home consumed all of that massive equity.
 
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Wetswinger said:
<snip>The starter house we bought in 1978 on the Sammamish Plateau for $35k just sold for a cool $1,000,000 last week...
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The starter home we bought in 1983 on the Sammamish Plateau, all 1200 sq.ft finished and 500 sq. ft unfinished. is now estimated at $1,424,000.
 
krusty said:
I guess the real question is whether this housing situation is a bubble, and how the long term demographic shifts will impact its sustainability. The long term property tax implications are also staggering.

It's easy to visualize a great many homeowners making use of rapidly escalating equity value for any number of depreciating consumptive purposes, and then finding themselves deeply under-water.

At the other end of the home buying age spectrum, as equity loaded boomers attempt to downsize, they rapidly drive up the prices of what once were starter homes. I've several retired neighbors who've simply decided to stay in their large homes since downsizing to a much smaller home consumed all of that massive equity.
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If Blackstone, pension funds, professional investors, investment groups, etc. are buying up so much, as been discussed here before, they are looking for returns and stability. I bet they do not see a bubble taking place. The last bubble I remember was based on fundamental financial structural issues - people buying homes they had not business buying and interest rates too low, and the notes/mortgages being sold on the secondary market were not worth the paper they were printed on. That is not the case now...

For those that are deciding to on keep living in large homes, there are maintenance requirements. The longer they hold onto the homes, the more they need due to age of the home. Us older folks in that situation can not longer do some of them. I am not going up on the roof - period. Based on what I have experienced they are no longer inexpensive. They are downright expensive IF you can get someone to even do them.
 
RCF said:
If Blackstone, pension funds, professional investors, investment groups, etc. are buying up so much, as been discussed here before, they are looking for returns and stability. I bet they do not see a bubble taking place. The last bubble I remember was based on fundamental financial structural issues - people buying homes they had not business buying and interest rates too low, and the notes/mortgages being sold on the secondary market were not worth the paper they were printed on. That is not the case now...

For those that are deciding to on keep living in large homes, there are maintenance requirements. The longer they hold onto the homes, the more they need due to age of the home. Us older folks in that situation can not longer do some of them. I am not going up on the roof - period. Based on what I have experienced they are no longer inexpensive. They are downright expensive IF you can get someone to even do them.
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You may well be correct, though I remember Greenspan ardently discounting the possibility of a housing bubble before the 2008 meltdown, because he stated we were in a 'fundamentally different' economic environment.

Having served several decades on the board of a large portfolio pension fund I watched the market movements (always of course focused on rate of return) fall in and out of love with derivatives, private equity, venture capital, mezzanine debt, hedge funds, and REITs. Things are always great...until they aren't. Very frequently forgotten (or inadequately recognized) by even large institutional investors is the risk component.
 
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I remember when those homes on the plateau were 'expensive' in comparison to the homes in Issaquah, that was in the early to mid 70's.
Then the plateau blew up, houses started popping up all over, did a bunch of work up there through the late 80's.
Then other places blew up.

....and so it goes...
 
This time the fundamentals are different than last time, last time they were different than the milder correction felt in housing around the dot com bust and different than the softening in housing in the PNW in the mid 90's. The commonality between this time and last time is that its unsustainable notwithstanding the skewed supply/demand equation. Some of you on this thread have been in housing for a very long time or on the periphery, alot of experience and wisdom here, 35 years for me so not as long as some. Last time when it was all said and done in 2011 you could pick up as many brand new garden variety lots as you wanted in Bend for 15-20k if you had cash that had been trading for 150k 3 years earlier. In Boise/TV valley in 2011 it was estimated that there were approx. 8 - 10,000 finished lots on the ground that nobody wanted, many/most could be had for 10k +/-.

It's a volatile industry, last time was an absolute bloodbath.

Buyer Beware!
 
We've been looking here in Port Townsend for a few years and it's just getting increasingly impossible. Our savings has increased and we're OK down payment-wise. I just have a hard time accepting what we need to pay for a tiny place that's barely liveable. Houses I looked at in 2016-17 (we weren't quite ready) have just about doubled and are now out of reach. I'm all for doing my own renovations/improvements, I always have, but with a bloated mortgage, we couldn't afford to make improvements. So...we wait. Our rental situation is good and reasonable—for the area—but that could change at any time. I hope a correction comes soon. My income has not doubled in the last 5-6 years. Relocating is possible but we're trying to stay near elderly family in the area.
 
ThatGuyRyRy said:
I'm hoping to move to your neighborhood from Tacoma, and part of that is to escape Tacoma prices. I no longer have to commute daily so being as close to home isn't as necessary, but even in those other places, the price of a starter home has skyrocketed even when there aren't any jobs to support living in any of those starter homes. One of the prime motivators for us is just to have a backyard so my kids don't break everything I own in my house and to think about what options we have for school for both of them. We definitely are not looking for something crazy, but my wife is just about to go back to school because we can't make it work on a single income + part-time income anymore.

Here the latest from the NYTimes on how its hitting Spokane.
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The times wouldn't let me access the article but I'm guessing that it says something like this.

"About 53% of the houses sold in Spokane County in 2012 were affordable to someone who qualifies as a first-time buyer. By 2020, that number had fallen to 14.8%"
 
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