What's The 2014 Real Estate Market Going To Look Like?

We just returned from the National Association of REALTORS annual conference and listened to a number of experts and pundits opine on what the real estate market will look like next year. It is expected the dollar volume of home sales will rise modestly next year but the growth will come primariily from rising home prices and not unit sales. Why? The combination of conservative underwriting standards by mortgage lenders and constrained inventory of saleable houses both resale and new is likely to result in flat unit sales next year. A broader influence is the sluggish recovery of our economy. Economists consider a minimum healthy growth rate to be 3 percent and most forecast next years growth to be in the 1-2 percent range.

Of course real estate is very local and greater Lansing may not act according to what is predicted nationally. We do think prices here will continue to rise though unevenly across the market. Affordability here is still quite good despite some uptick in mortgage interest rates  and though new listings have slowed there is inventory, especially at higher price points where there is little competition from investors. Our local economy remains strong and consumer confidence is good as well. So, we expect unit and volume growth next year and a healthy though not exuberant market in general.

It is still a great time to buy or sell.