The historic growth in real estate prices that began after the global pandemic surfaced in 2020 shows signs of cooling, but continues to support growth in home prices. That is good news for home buyers and sellers as expected trends for 2022 continue to emerge.
By the end of 2021, the real estate market nationally continued to experience unseasonably high activity. Typically, home buying slows as the weather cools and holidays draw near. While home sellers did pull back in late 2021, offering fewer listings for buyers to consider, the buying continued as the threat loomed that mortgage rates might climb in 2022.
New construction also continued to lag in its ability to fill the gap in housing inventory, meaning the buyers who were looking had fewer options to consider. That meant continued high prices for homes listed on the market and fewer days they stayed on the market for sale. The convergence of these factors means in the short-term, the real estate market in many areas will stay active. It also means that buyers looking for Orlando homes for sale pool in the US will need to rely on a dependable source for housing options that are on the market. And in the UK, trusted estate agents in Ilford can help you navigate the market.
Here are ways that home buyers and sellers can both benefit from expected housing trends.
Inventory offers good news for sellers and buyers
In the spirit of finding the silver lining in bad news, consider the implications of housing inventory on the market for sellers and buyers. Of course, when inventory is low, that’s good news for sellers and bad news for buyers. Low inventory means sellers can price their property higher and buyers will compete for limited properties for sale. The opposite is true when inventory is high, because sellers are competing with an abundance of properties for sale and likely must reduce their prices for buyers to compete.
News in the real estate market in late 2021 offered hope for both buyers and sellers. First, the number of new listings for homes continued to decrease. The number of active listings of homes for sale also continued to drop. That translates to good news for sellers because there are fewer homes competing for buyers. That’s bad news for buyers because it means they might have to pay more than the asking price to compete with other buyers.
However, other news is more favorable to buyers, albeit perhaps not immediately. Listing price increases for homes put on the market remained stable in late 2021, an indication that the housing market may be cooling off with at least a stall in the rate of increase in housing prices. National real estate professional groups also report a growth in the number of homeowners who say they plan to sell in the next six months, a sign that the inventory of homes on the market could increase in 2022. That all translates into good news for buyers, with the hope that housing prices will stabilize and the number of houses for sale will increase, so buyers have more options.
More good news for sellers
The end of 2021 offered more good news for homeowners looking to sell. The amount of time that homes listed for sale stayed on the market remains lower than a year ago. On average, homes stayed on the market about 10 days less in late 2021 than during the same period in 2020 when the real estate market nationally was beginning to heat up. This matters because the latter part of the year historically is a time when real estate sales slow. Because nothing is normal in 2021 when it comes to real estate, the sales activity at the end of the year continued to surpass the previous year, even surpassing the more active summer months historically recorded in past years.
The sales activity in Florida metropolitan areas such as Orlando and Miami is even more intense, with homes selling faster than the national average. Living in Brandon Mississippi could be a great choice if you are looking for affordable prices. In Orlando, homes for sale stayed on the market 18 fewer days in late 2021 compared to 2020.
More good news for buyers
There are a couple of other encouraging signs for home buyers as real estate market trends emerge for 2022. The share of homes for sale on the market that experienced price reductions has increased compared to 2020. This means that more sellers actually are lowering their asking price for homes after months of instances in which sellers increased their sale price for homes that were on the market. While the share of price reductions remains higher than in the more typical real estate market of 2019, the increase in price reductions for homes listed for sale compared to 2020 offers hope to buyers.
Another positive trend for buyers is the increase in activity in the new construction market. While still historically low, the pace of new construction continued to increase in late 2021. The number of housing starts jumped, meaning more new construction projects were started. And the number of housing permits requested increased, meaning more builders obtained permission to construct new homes in the coming months.
All of that new construction activity signals more inventory of homes in 2022, which could help buyers with options. The more new construction homes there are available to buy, the more competition exists with existing homes for sale, which can help limit or reduce housing prices.
What to do next as the real estate market continues to change
All of the activity in 2021 in the real estate market and the trends expected in 2022 mean that buyers and sellers can both take steps. First, you will need a reliable source for home listings to consider what homes are on the market. You can see more here if you are a buyer to learn what home options you have and, as a seller, see what homes that are similar to yours are selling for. Information is power, to both the buyer and the seller.
