Now that sellers are seeing home values continue to rise, we are fielding more questions about the current real estate market. More importantly, what is happening in the south Myrtle Beach area. Overall, home prices are continuing to rise and the demand to get into these homes even greater. We thought we would do some research to see if we could identify any trends that would help home sellers and buyers in the south Myrtle Beach real estate market.
The National Association of Realtors (NAR) keeps historic data on many aspects of homeownership. One of the data points that has changed dramatically is the median tenure of a family in a home. As the graph below shows, for over twenty years (1985-2008), the median tenure averaged exactly six years. However, since 2008, that average is almost nine years – an increase of almost 50%.
We turned to the National Association of Realtors who completed an extensive survey to home buyers and sellers on October 31, 2016, as the results are in! Let’s recap some of the key points.
Selling a home: seller use of an agent remains at all-time high; wanting a bigger house primary reason for selling
For the second straight year, 89 percent of sellers sold their home with an agent. This in turn — also for the second year in a row — kept for-sale-by-owner sales to their lowest share (8 percent) since the survey’s 1981 inception and below 10 percent since 2012.
“Although the imbalance of supply in relation to demand in recent year’s continues to put many sellers in the driver’s seat, they’re still looking for a Realtor® now more than ever to price their home competitively, market their home to the widest number of eyes possible and ultimately help close the deal within a given timeframe,” added Salomone.
The typical seller over the past year was 54 years old (unchanged since 2014), had a household income of $100,700 ($104,100 in 2015), and was in the home for 10 years before selling — a year longer than 2015 and matching the all-time high in 2014. Fewer sellers indicated they wanted to sell earlier but were stalled because their home had been worth less than their mortgage (12 percent versus 14 percent a year ago); the figure was 17 percent in 2014.
Sellers realized a median equity gain of $43,100 ($40,000 in 2015) — a 24 percent increase (23 percent last year) over the original purchase price. Homes sold after 21 years of ownership had the largest equity gain (124 percent or $127,600); underlining the volatility during the downturn, equity gains fell to 3 percent for owners who bought between eight and 10 years ago.
Back in the 2012 survey, it typically took respondents 11 weeks to sell their home. With tight inventory conditions gripping most markets once again over the past year, sellers were considerably more successful finding a buyer in a shorter amount of time, with homes typically on the market for only a month.
A tad more sellers traded up (44 percent) compared to last year (42 percent) and slightly more, at 32 percent, traded down (31 percent in 2015). Sellers moved a median distance of 20 miles — 72 percent stayed in the same state — and the most popular reason given for selling their home was it being too small (18 percent).
Feedback from sellers underscored once again that referrals and repeat business remain a large source of new opportunities for real estate agents. Nearly two-thirds of responding sellers either found their real estate agent through a referral by a friend, neighbor or relative, or used their agent from a previous transaction. Additionally, 85 percent of sellers indicated that they would definitely or probably use their agent again or recommend him or her to others.
NAR mailed a 132-question survey in July 2016 using a random sample weighted to be representative of sales on a geographic basis to 93,171 recent home buyers. Respondents had the option to fill out the survey via hard copy or online; the online survey was available in English and Spanish. A total of 5,465 responses were received from primary residence buyers. After accounting for undeliverable questionnaires, the survey had an adjusted response rate of 5.9 percent. The sample at the 95 percent confidence level has a confidence interval of plus-or-minus 1.32 percent.
The recent home buyers had to have purchased a home between July of 2015 and June of 2016. All information is characteristic of the 12-month period ending in June 2016 with the exception of income data, which are for 2015.
The National Association of Realtors®, “The Voice for Real Estate,” is America’s largest trade association, representing over 1.1 million members involved in all aspects of the residential and commercial real estate industries.
If you are considering selling your home, we are seeing remarkable results in days on market, list to sales ratios and multiple offer situations. To get an instant home valuation for your home, click here, and Matt will follow up with a more in depth CMA. Or, call Matt at 843-267-7556 and make an appointment to see why the Matt Harper Real Estate team is your best south Myrtle Beach choice for selling your home fast and for top dollar.