We are currently seeing an amazing opportunity in real estate! The Portland housing market has skyrocketed. People moving into the area are waiving inspection and paying thousands above the asking price on homes this very moment. Even though your home may not be perfect, the time to sell is right now! “But wait,” you may be saying to yourself. “If my home isn’t perfect, then shouldn’t I try to remodel so I can cash in the most on the market?” To that question, we say, “Absolutely not.” With backlogged construction of new homes, heightening cost of building materials, and a forecasted dip in the market in the near future, don’t waste your time and money on renovations that you may see no return on. Strike now while the market is hot and get cash for your home!

It was a shock to many property sellers and economists when the real estate market shot up in April of 2020. With the shutdown occurring and many areas in lockdown of property sales, it was predicted that real estate would take a dive. Quite the opposite occurred. People began realizing that with the work from home orders, they could theoretically work from anywhere in the world so long as they had internet access. As a result, many began their search for a home in their dream location (or one in a more desirable place than where they were currently located). This, paired with record-low mortgage rates, gave many an opportunity that they had been waiting for, so they jumped on it. Sales began to soar, and so did the prices.

By December of 2020, while mortgage rates remained low around 3%, home sales had sailed to their highest in the last 14 years. With this mix of high sales, low rates, and depleting supply of available listings, buyers began to scuffle financially over the remaining listings available at any given time. Housing on the market that had only been there for a few days had already received tons of offers, many of them now offering thousands above the asking price and waiving any inspections in order to get their foot through that door. This has driven average home prices for all types of housing to skyrocket, up 12.9% from December 2019 and hitting 106 consecutive months of year-over-year gains. Simply put, we are at the peak of an insanely tall housing market. As is said, what goes up must come down. This trend of multiple-year gains will likely hit its wall. Soon, new home construction will finally be back to schedule and more housing will begin to flood the market, causing prices to become more normalized again. It is predicted that median housing prices will increase somewhere between 3-8% over the course of 2021, merely a shadow of the rise we saw in 2020. While this reduction in increase won’t cause a crash, it will cause you to miss out on a hot market if you wait too much longer.

With the current backup in new home construction, those who are moving to the area are desperate for homes to purchase. This has been leading buyers to compete for the few items that are on the market, and boy is the competition tight! Many realtors are currently advising people to shop under their budget because home purchases are often going for thousands above asking price. This has caused the housing market to inflate to crazy prices, which is awesome for the sellers! The only catch is that this current market state is not predicted to last. Many experts are predicting a slow in price progression of the housing market. Even though a crash isn’t expected, the market will not remain hot like this for long.

Normally, when foreclosures occur during a time of high unemployment and a ton of new home listings flood the market, the price of homes often depress. This is what played a huge part in the 2008 housing crash and contributed to the Great Recession to follow. With the pandemic, there were many forbearance programs in place that allowed homeowners to delay monthly mortgage payments without having to worry about incurring penalties. This has made the 2020 recession very different from the market crash from the 2000’s. However, with the world starting to slowly start back up, these forbearance programs that will soon lift won’t save everyone from a foreclosure. It is anticipated that at least 200,000 defaults will occur in 2021, which will flood the market with housing. Furthermore, it is also predicted that we will see a 70% increase in foreclosures over the following two years. With these market events on the horizon, it can be safely said that now is the time to sell your home fast, especially with home equity currently being so high.

The overall value of homes in the past year has skyrocketed beyond what anyone could have anticipated. The average homeowner has seen an increase of about $26,300 in equity just by the end of 2020. Homeowners who bought their houses at a lower price have reached a high, and now it’s time to sell and get a piece of the pie! With your home’s value inherently higher now than all this time leading up to it, it would behoove you to not risk letting the market drop before selling! Extra steps that involve more people and projects all run the risk of lengthening your timeline and preventing you from selling your home at its peak value in this high equity market. Projects like renovations that take too much time and more money may cause your sales plan to fall flat and for you to miss out.

Although it may seem counterintuitive, renovations are not always the best route to take when selling a home, especially right now with how the shortages and higher pricing of materials and help. No matter what the market looks like, home improvement projects can be a gamble with your time and money. There has been a multitude of situations where sellers have invested tons of money and time into improving their home before selling only to have buyers not see the worth of their efforts! These buyers tour the home (sometimes not even noticing the improvements made) and don’t feel that the renovations have added any significant value to the home and therefore aren’t willing to pay for the increase in the property’s value. This leaves the buyer high and dry, having invested so much into home improvement only to find that they’ve lost money in it since the buyers don’t see the significance in what the renovations have done.

The risk of this is even higher right now, as the costs of building materials have skyrocketed! As we are sure you have noticed, there has been a shortage in a myriad of merchandise and resources recently, even outside of construction supplies! Lumber and other materials have jumped in price as a result of skyrocketing demand and a lack of supply. The shutdown caused many suppliers to halt production and not be able to produce as much. Now that the construction world is starting to ramp up again, suppliers are struggling to make up for lost time and create the products that companies and people are demanding again. As a result, we see the crazy high prices for our building materials. Despite the risk that remodeling a home for sale had before, it is even harder now to get a return on your remodeling with the heightened price on the materials and people needed to do it! Prices of remodels aren’t the only thing that has heightened recently – the wait time for available professionals to come and work on your home has dramatically increased, too.

During more normal work conditions, remodeling your home can take months if not longer depending on the work you need done. Now with the ramped-up demand for home improvements thanks to the shutdown, there are many home project/renovation companies that are booked months out before they can come to help work on your home. With this many setbacks and delays, who knows how long even the simplest of home improvement projects can take? Waiting to remodel your home before selling is a risk with how hot the market is. We may be at a high now, but the market won’t be like this forever. It is unknown when a market correction will be made, but experts are seeing one coming. Don’t take the risk. Get cash for your home and sell fast without the stresses and expenses of a remodel all while still getting the peak value for your home.

Right now, the housing market here in Portland is at a peak. We’re all familiar with Newton’s Law of gravity – that what goes up, must eventually come down. Don’t get left in the dust without cashing in on this amazing opportunity! Get cash for your home and sell fast! With our team offering you a no-strings-attached cash offer within 48 hours of us inspecting your home, you’ll be getting a fair cash offer for your home without any of the risks that remodeling might bring. Sell your home fast by giving us a call today.