Boulder Real Estate News & Stats; 9/23/22

Friends,

THE HEADLINES:

Locally, there is a bit more inventory and price reductions just jumped up. It can be a great time to be a buyer right now, and broadly speaking, sellers, Boulder real estate agents still need inventory. Nationally, cash purchases are at a 31% rate.

Watch the video below to find out more…

BUYERS

In many ways, it is a great time to be a buyer. You have less competition, more choice, and more time to make decisions. Cash buyers may have a competitive advantage (depending on how their contract is written), though buyers with loans are also able to have their pick of great properties and refinance when interest rates go down.

SELLERS

When you look at our chart of total inventory, you see that we’re not yet at inventory highpoint, we’re still mostly in a seller’s market. (A few parts of the market are buyer strong, let’s be in touch to discuss). The important thing is to prepare your home in a way so that when you come to market, you’ll have the house that sells. Our Boulder realtor team is happy to consult on what that means for your specific home. Please reach out to us to discuss.

Local Market Details – Boulder County

We had 109 new listings come to market last week, vs 119 in 2018, 97 in 2019, 104 in 2020, and 108 in 2021.

89 properties went under contract, in comparison with 80 in 2018, 88 in 2019, 105 in 2020, and 123 in 2021; the under-contract rate last week for Boulder realtors shows healthy buyer participation after some quiet periods during the last 3 months.

So, last week we had a 20 unit gain in inventory. We’re still not in the range of the inventory highs since 2012, but we’re out of the inventory basement.

Activity By Price Band and Price Reductions- Boulder County

In the last two weeks, we’ve seen robust buyer activity in the $1.5-2.5mm price bands. There was decent activity in all the other price bands. Right now, all price levels are engaging with the market, which is a sign of health.

There were 92 Boulder County price reductions last week. After 5 weeks of declining price reduction numbers, Boulder County realtors reported a decent uptick last week. We’ll have to keep watching to see if this is a one-off increase or if sellers are again adjusting price due to increasing inventory and lower buyer demand.

Across the 41 most populated US metro areas, 31% of homes in July sold with cash, up from 27.5% year-over-year. Within the Denver metro area, 28% of July sales sold with cash.

Cash purchases became more popular in 2022 (and throughout the pandemic) as they allowed buyers to create stronger offers in the competitive bidding-war market; as a reminder, the sub-3% mortgage rates and ability to work remotely drove homebuyer demand up during late 2020, 2021 and 2022. Remote work increased the number of buyers able to pay cash, as many remote workers were able to liquidate their record-setting homes in expensive parts of the country and to move to more affordable parts of the country. About three-quarters of investor home purchases are made with cash; loads of people are investing in real estate during this time when equities are less stable.

When you talk with friends around the nation, note that cash-buyer rates vary enormously (66.5%-15.1%), which impacts how the local markets work, see the chart below. Denver Metro comes in at 28.1%, meaning that a cash buyer has some cache that makes sellers take notice.