The real estate market has all but bottomed out. Interest rates can’t go any lower. As the saying goes: ‘buy low, sell high’! For investors and buyers, now is a golden time to buy.
What if you need to sell before you can buy?
You can sell your home in today’s market, but only if you do three things correctly: price right, stage right and be in the right location. If you don’t properly price your home, it won’t sell. It’s that simple. There is too much inventory on the market. If you don’t stage your home properly, you may be delaying the sale of your property (some agents won’t even show it). And if you aren’t located in a fantastic area, you need to price even more aggressively.
Whether you are an investor looking to diversify your portfolio, or a buyer that wants to get in at the bottom of the market, consider these recent facts:
Interest rate projection by NAR:
In short, it’s never been cheaper to finance buying a home. And compare the prices for gold, which are at an all time high, to the prices of homes, which are at an all time low. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure out where to put your money. Need more proof that we are at the bottom of the market? America’s leading economist, Mark Zandi, gave his thoughts at a recent NAR convention:
“The housing crash is over—nearly. We are now near the bottom,” Zandi said. “There will be no real price growth in 2010 or 2011. Whether home prices weaken is unclear, but it will take two more years to work off excess housing inventory at the current sales pace. Of course, if demand picks up, it would take less time for prices to rise.”
To get some perspective from the inside, we talked to Andy Skillen with Atlanta Intown Real Estate Services, on what he is seeing:
“Every buyer has different goals, some of which are competing”, said Skillen. We have a buyer who wants a great deal on a high rise condo, with the best resale value, and that can be easily rented out. The challenge is that it’s easier to get financing on a unit with rental restrictions, so the resale value is higher, but you can’t just turn around and rent it. The good news is that he can get a 2 bedroom, 2 bath off Peachtree with amazing Big City views for what used to be the price of a one bedroom. For those lucky enough to be buying, there are amazing deals, but it’s still a lot of work to find the best deal.”
An option that some home owners, who aren’t desperate to sell, are considering is to rent out the place they own, and buy another property at 30-40% off the market high. That helps owners offset the losses on the first home, and puts you in a position to make money off today’s low real estate prices.