Hot Market in Cold Times
March 4th, 2010
Continually on media outlets that the economy is sluggish, unemployment close to double digits, bailout nation, and what ever fear the media can drum up to keep you watching. I die laughing at how outrageous some of the terminology is. If you watch network news you could think on any given day the world was coming to an end. What does this have to do with foreclosure? Well we are bombarded by these house statics showing all of us that the leading indicators are showing housing is doomed and the commercial market has yet to collapse. Well for my anecdotal perspective in real estate backed by many charts of data. Here in the Seattle Area foreclosure filings are down 22%, from 1100-ish per month to the mid 800’s. This is out of 560,000 house holds. That is 0.0016% of all of the homes in the Seattle/King county are currently in foreclosure. People want the deals but the scarcity is causing a blood bath out there. People are hungery for real estate deals. But remember in this city a deal is going to be $0.70 on the dollar. If you think; because you saw a commercial for a house selling for 3000 is going to be found in this city; don’t fool yourself. On average you will be paying between 300 and 500k for distressed home in this city. So, if you are thinking you are going to get deals at 0.40, 0.50 on the dollar, you will be chasing ghost. Land is scares, the population is well educated, they are healthy, the job market here has international demand, the city of Seattle did not allow for Urban Sprawl; and people haven’t stopped having babies. So everyday there is less space in a city that has high demand for goods and services. Put away the idea of what you saw on TV, because it does not apply in this town. The Distressed Real Estate Market is Hot! There are more buyers than product. Prepare yourself for competition; prepare yourself to write offers higher than asking. Prepare yourself to get less than what you saw on TV.
