If you’re looking for a home to purchase right now and having trouble finding one, you’re not alone states Mike Eastwood Chief Executive Officer of West USA Realty of Prescott. At a time like this when there are so   few   houses for sale, it’s normal to wonder if you’ll actually find one to buy. According to the   National Association of Realtors   ( NAR ), across the country, inventory of available homes for sale is at an all-time low – the lowest point recorded since NAR began tracking this metric in 1982.   There are, however, more homes expected to hit the market later this year. Let’s break down the three key places they’ll likely come from as 2021 continues on. 1. Homeowners Who Didn’t Sell Last Year In 2020, many sellers decided to pause their moving plans for a number of different reasons. From health concerns about the pandemic to financial uncertainty, plenty of homeowners decided not to move last year. Now that vaccines are being distributed a...

  The housing market has been scorching hot over the last twelve months. Buyers and their high demand have far outnumbered sellers and a short supply of houses states Mike Eastwood Chief executive Officer of West USA Realty of Prescott. According to the latest   Existing Home Sales Report   from the   National Association of Realtors   (NAR), sales are up 23.7% from the same time last year while the inventory of homes available for sale is down 25.7%.   There are 360,000 fewer single-family homes for sale today than there were at this time last year.   This increase in demand coupled with such limited supply is leading to more bidding wars throughout the country. Rose Quint,  Assistant Vice President for Survey Research  with the  National Association of Home Builders  (NAHB), recently  reported : “The number one reason long-time searchers haven’t made a home purchase is not because of their inability to find an affordably-pric...

   In today’s housing market, it seems harder than ever to find a home to buy. Before the health crisis hit us a year ago, there was already a shortage of homes for sale. When many homeowners delayed their plans to sell at the same time that more buyers aimed to take advantage of record-low mortgage rates and purchase a home, housing inventory dropped even further. Experts consider this to be the biggest challenge facing an otherwise hot market while buyers continue to compete for homes. As Danielle Hale,   Chief Economist  at   realtor.com ,   explains : “With buyers active in the market and seller participation lagging,  homes are selling quickly and   the total number available for sale at any point in time continues to drop lower . In  January  as a whole, the number of for sale homes  dropped below 600,000 .” Every month,  realtor.com  releases new  data  showing the year-over-year change in inventory of exi...

  With mortgage interest rates hitting   record lows   so many times recently, some are wondering if we’ll see low rates continue throughout 2021 states Mike Eastwood Chief Executive Officer of West USA Realty of Prescott, or if they’ll start to rise. Recently,   Freddie Mac   released their quarterly   forecast , noting: “The average 30-year fixed-rate mortgage hit a record low over a dozen times in 2020 and  the low interest rate environment is projected to continue through this year.  We expect interest rates to average below 3% through the end of 2021. While this is a modest rise from 2020 averages, the recent vote by the Federal Reserve to keep interest rates anchored near zero should keep rates low.” As shown in the graph below,  Freddie Mac  is projecting low rates going forward with a modest rise that’s expected to continue through 2022. Freddie Mac  isn’t the only authority forecasting low rates with a slight rise.  Fa...

  There have been a lot of headlines reporting on how homeowner equity (the difference between the current market value of your home and the amount you owe on your mortgage) has dramatically increased over the past few years states Mike Eastwood Chief Executive Officer of West USA Realty of Prescott.   CoreLogic   indicated that equity increased for the average homeowner by   $17,000   in the last year alone.   ATTOM Data Solutions , in their latest   U.S. Home Equity Report , revealed that 30.2% of the 59 million   mortgaged homes   in the United States have at least 50% equity. That doesn’t even include the   38% of homes   that are owned free and clear, meaning they don’t have a mortgage at all. How can equity help a household? Having equity in your home can dramatically impact your life. Equity is like a savings account you can tap into when you need cash. Like any other savings, you should be sensible in how you use it, though....