First things first, we welcome a new team member, Barbara Anderson, to the Bodeen Team and the HomeSmart Elite group. Though new to our group, Barb is not a novice to real estate. She is however getting back into the game after a prolonged absence in the education field. Barb and hubby Bruce just celebrated their 44th wedding anniversary.
Barb joined us yesterday for her first HomeSmart Elite monthly meeting. It was indeed timely as our keynote speaker, Director Michael Orr of ASU’s W.P. Carey School of Business presented the Elite Group with encouraging homeowner data and trends indicating that change is already afoot in our local real estate market. You will be hearing about this starting now in the local news.
The Bodeen Team subscribes to Mr. Orr’s market data which we view in real-time each day. Our subscription grants us permission to reproduce his information to you. I would say that there are few, if any entities in the country that have the amazing statistical data that Orr does. He starts each meeting with the caveat that his background is mathematics, and his passion is real estate trends and numbers.
And I should clarify that the news was positive for homeowners but not so much for buyers who are still on the sidelines, unless they decide to become a homeowner sooner rather than later. That to me was the important take-away from this meeting yesterday.
Michael provided us with a whimsical chart (see below) showing us his “Market Cycles.” As you can see, he believes we are re-entering a period of “Optimism” which last occurred 12 years ago in 2003. This period historically preceded the Three E’s: Enthusiasm, Exhilaration, Euphoria. This is when sales and appreciation happened at dizzying intensity. It was an exciting time, but it wasn’t fun.
Another very interesting chart shows the annual rate for U.S. Household Formation. According to this chart, the number of newly formed households radically spiked in the last quarter of 2014. This, among other issues (see Summary below) could create huge demand.
There are a number of reasons why Orr is so Seller Bullish
- Supply is well below normal (83% of normal)
- Demand is low but growing (95% of normal)
- AZ loan delinquency below normal at 4.5%
- Foreclosures below long term average
- Lending rules starting to loosen
- Entry market heating up
- High end market cooling down
- Economy and jobs continue to improve
- Time to change from relief to optimism
He also didn’t see any slowdown for single family detached rental demand as he points out that we have only a 25 day amount of rental inventory available. And, he adds, is in the higher priced end. The supply for home rentals priced between $900 and $1200 per month is down 50% from a year ago.
So there we have it. In the words first memorialized in song by Bob Dylan, ‘The times they are a changin.’ Hang on.
