Yes, the economy is in the midst of a bit of a crisis, and for obvious reasons. There is, however, one bright spot and that is the housing market.
Traffic on a large real estate company’s website “… is up about 40 percent, and the National Association of Realtors announced that pending home sales are up 15 percent from last month,” according to NPR’s Stacey Vanek Smith and Cardiff Garcia.
A wide swath of American homebuyers is being propelled out of urban areas to suburbs and rural regions by “… conditions related to coronavirus, and the understanding that the way … that some of us work — has fundamentally changed,” Smith and Garcia wrote.
Then, there are others who dropped out of the market at the outset of the pandemic and have decided to re-enter.
If you’ve toyed with the idea of selling your home, now is the perfect time. Read on to learn why you should not let this opportunity pass you by.
Home equity at record highs
Do you have any idea how much equity you have in your home? Many homeowners haven’t a clue, but it’s worth finding out.
Mortgage data firm Black Knight found that “Americans’ home equity reached a record high earlier this year, according to Jeff Ostrowski, senior mortgage reporter for Bankrate.com.
With mortgage rates so low (see below) and your hefty equity, that dream home may just become a reality.
Mortgage rates are oh, so low and may go lower
Mortgage rates are mercurial and almost impossible to predict. However, “… many experts foresee rates falling below 3 percent in the next six months to a year,” Ostrowski claims.
He goes on to say that while the current low rates may not compel you to sell your home to buy another, “… a 2.75 percent rate probably would.”
If you’re waiting for a specific mortgage interest rate to occur, let us know. We’ll keep an eye on rates for you and let you know if and when it happens.
Home prices are amazing for sellers
Those low mortgage rates are encouraging homebuyers to jump into the market. That, in turn, increases demand and, subsequently, home prices.
“In July, the [national] median home price shot up 8.5% year over year, to hit a new all-time high of $349,000,” according to Clare Trapasso, citing the most recent realtor.com® data.
Homes are flying off the market
The average number of days a home remains on the market, nationwide, is 24 days. This news is especially welcome for home sellers who need to move quickly.
If you don’t have forbearance, sell the home
If you don’t have a federally-backed mortgage, you didn’t qualify for mortgage forbearance under the federal Cares Act.
Many lenders of non-federally backed mortgages decided that they, too, would offer forbearance, but not all of them, and not on all loans.
If you didn’t qualify either way, and you’re delinquent on your mortgage, consider selling the home.
The sooner you do it, the less you will owe the lender at closing. If you wait, you’ll face foreclosure.
The real estate market has always been a moving target and that hasn’t changed. One day mortgage rates are down, the next day they rise. Likewise, nobody can predict the duration of what is currently an amazing seller’s market.
The time to sell your home, if you been considering doing so, is right now.
