This Thanksgiving as we are sharing a meal with our relatives, sometimes heated discussions come up as the mashed potatoes and bean casserole are being passed around, including the popular topic of real estate.
Like me, you may have your own Aunt Trish who is an expert in ALL conversation topics. She has a cure for whatever ails you, she offers endless advice on parenting, cooking, automotive repair, how the country should be run, and has an endless supply of snappy retorts.
Bless her heart as she likes to engage me in a battle on real estate. But for those non-Realtors out there, I want to prepare you to BATTLE with confidence and WIN your own Aunt Trish Banter-Olympics with these factual stats about the local Olympia WA real estate market:
Aunt Trish: “OMG, the real estate market is slowing down. I don’t know who in their right mind would try to sell their house now.”
You: “The Olympia real estate market just hit a record seller’s market with 1.01 months supply. It is the lowest absorption rate on record – ever. You know what absorption rate is, right Aunt Trish?”
Aunt Trish: “Well, of course, I know all about absorption rate and how real estate is absorbed.”
You: “Absorption rate shows supply and demand. In other words, if all the buyers available purchased all the homes available, it would take a certain amount of time. A balanced market is a 4-6 month supply. With just 1.01 months supply, the Olympia market is firmly seated in a seller’s market.”
“And I can also go on to discuss why listing your home in the fall and winter is actually a great time to do so. If you’d like to discuss that more, check out my blog post here.”
Aunt Trish: “The market is coming to an end. The politics of this country are going down the drain and so is the real estate market. Buyers will be back in the driver seat again.”
You: “Not really. In order for our real estate market to just get a balanced market, not even a buyer’s market, we would need a 281 percent increase in listings to meet the current pace of sales and we would need a 74 percent drop in monthly sales. It’s unlikely that will happen next year or anytime soon.”
Aunt Trish: “I don’t know who is buying. Home prices are so high.”
You: “The good news for buyers is because interest rates have gone down, they have more buying power and their interest rate has erased the price increases in the market. It is actually more affordable for buyers now than it was in the spring this year because of the interest rates. And Thurston County is the most affordable county along the I-5 corridor according to the Runstad Department of Real Estate at the University of Washington.”
Aunt Trish: “Can you pass the rolls?”
If you find yourself this Thanksgiving backed into a corner by your own Aunt Trish, text me and I’ll help you out! Like the chefs at Butterball, I’ll be here to answer your real estate questions.
Happy Thanksgiving! And cheers to a peaceful dinner table!