There sure is a lot of bad new out there right now and it’s easy to get down and out.  Well overall you need to think “what is happening here.”  What is important to me.  Yes there are 25,000 Vacant Home in Phoenix and Home Values are down 10% or more but that is Phoenix.  No dis-respect to the Valley of the Sun but that was a situation waiting to happen.  They constantly over build and the flat landscape there and easy permitting process makes the development and building process way to easy.  Thousands and thousands of homes have been built and when the slow down hit the inertia was still onward and upward.  Projects continued to build long after home sales cooled there.  But that is there and this is here.

What I call the “Phoenix-Effect” is happening all over the Country in places where easy land use laws and lax controls on growth allow that to happen.  It’s the same case in Las Vegas, Austin, and other big markets.  But the smaller cities where planning has limited growth are much more vibrant and limited im terms of how many units are on the market or can come onto the market at any one time.  METRO, our regional Planning Agency, has made sure that growth is often managed and painfully slow to happen.

So when we talk about growth and new homes coming up in the Portland area we talk about tens of units instead of hundreds.  Therefore this market slow down is less pronounced and will be more short lived as a result.  It is all a supply and demand issue correct?  We have an ample supply of new homes and demand is still pretty good but we sure do not have an oversupply problem.  The Early part of 2008 should clean out the last few straggler homes in most areas and if any sustained sales come about…we could be back to a short supply again.

What has happened now is that Banks have stopped funding new home neighborhoods and spec loans and builders have backed off on new construction.  Where this leaves us is in a situation where the supply is being tightened here quickly and we did not have that much to go with in the first place.  The builders caught up in what appears to be a purely psychological pause in the market are making great deals.  The Buying Opportunity appears to be be upon us.  I recommend purchasing a home in the next 1-4 months if you are planning to do so with the proviso you get a value that reflects the comps occurring this month.  The price per sf has settled down and is in a comfortable range where it seems to be settling in for the holiday run.

If you are looking to bu or sell a home you will want to call Dirk Knudsen and talk through your plans and how you can attack this market and get in on some of these buys.  We provide professional buyers brokerage and all of the tools you need to shop online and be the first to get the best buys.  We also feature an exclusive relationship with the Lendingtree and Costco Real Estate Program that can save you thousands when you buy or sell!  Call 503-799-8383 to find out more about how this works.  It really is a great deal.

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 8th, 2007 at 6:55 pm and is filed under PDX Housing Trends. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.