Housing boom: Why people are paying thousands above asking price
VENTURA, Calif. (NewsNation) — All over the country, the inventory of houses for sale is way down. Meanwhile, interest rates are low and more people are willing and able to move.
In a beautiful coastal community halfway between L.A. and Santa Barbara, you'll need more than good luck to find the right house at the right price.
In some Ventura neighborhoods, virtually nothing is available.
"Everything is just on fire. If you have a listing, it’s gonna sell," said veteran real estate agent Mike Love. "I’ve even had buyers that were buying stuff sight unseen."
He recently listed a newly-renovated, 2,300 square foot home in Ventura. It sold in a day.
The owner agreed to take the first full price offer of $1.2 million.
Many more offers were likely and, based on what’s been happening lately, that’s a time-consuming hassle.
"Thirty-two offers. Thirty-two offers. I mean, that’s a lot of work in my eyes. I don’t want to call all 32 agents. Or 31 of them and give them the news that hey, they didn’t win," said Love, who is an agent and owner of EXP Realty.
Things are even crazier to the north in and around Silicon Valley.
Real estate agent Jayson Madani fielded multiple offers for a 3,200 square foot home in Santa Cruz County as soon as it listed.
The buying boom in many areas is backed by big buck offers.
"A lot of them are cash. Easily $100,000 or more over list. Even one property that had 30 offers, 13 of them being all cash, that sold for $600,000 over list price and that property was a fixer-upper," said Madani, who is the founder of ROOM Real Estate.
Near Sacramento, there were 122 offers in one weekend for a 1,400 square foot listing in Citrus Heights.
Anita and Barry Jackier are moving to Idaho and buying there was just as frantic.
“That house was on the market for three hours. Three hours!”
According to U.S. News and World Report, the Top 10 housing markets are:
There are actually quite a few hot lists out there and they vary because homes are selling fast across the country.
Brian Sinkoff is a real estate agent in Albany. "Right now, here are the buyers and here are the sellers. And when there’s supply and demand, you know what happens. It’s like getting a Cabbage Patch doll in the 1980s. Right? Nobody had them and everybody wanted them," he said.
That’s why sellers everywhere are hearing a common warning: plot and plan the next step before listing.
"Step number one is not putting a for sale sign on the front yard. Your house is probably going to sell and you might be homeless. Or you might be moving twice," said Spartanburg, South Carolina agent Brian Hurry.
New construction so far this year has failed to meet the demand and that has North Las Vegas creeping further north.
Mark Hillers and his family are looking here after striking out elsewhere.
"We’ve considered older homes. Put an offer on a couple of them but we lost. We offered full price and it was not enough," Hillers said.
The National Association of Home Builders expects new construction to continue lagging behind demand and overall inventory will remain tight just because so many people are in the market to move.
"For the most part, there’s a crazy, crazy shortage in the market," Love said.
With the pandemic easing, the housing inventory is expected to improve in May when the industry traditionally sees an uptick in activity. Interest rates will likely be higher by then so some analysts predict a cooling in the market by the end of the year.