Austin-Round Rock

Central Texas Housing Data

Quote:

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"January marks the fifteenth consecutive month of year-over-year median sales price declines in the Austin Round Rock housing market, empowering more homebuyers to enter our market. Mortgage rates peaked in late October before declining in November and December, providing a boost to buyer's purchasing power, which is borne out in the increase in residential homes sold in January. While there are more options available for homebuyers in our market today, more work needs to be done to ensure more affordable housing is available in Central Texas. ABoR will continue to work to champion housing policies aimed at assisting those who need it the most and collaborate with Austin City Council."

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Austin Facts

• Median sales prices fell 4.4% YOY to $430,000 while closed sales increased 4.3% YOY to 1,667.
• I wonder if we'll see a median sales price average below $400K for all of Central Texas by the end of the year. This would definitely bode well for those new buyers that have recently been priced out of the market.
• New data point with average close to list price being included. We saw a 2% increase YOY to finish at 93%.
• Months inventory increased month over month from 3.0 months to 3.2 months. This is still 0.2 months higher YOY.
• February is going to be a GREAT month for me and my client. I had one property close early this month and have two more set to close by the end of the month. My client killed it with our rebate and listing fees. He saved close to $28,000 in rebates and reduced listing commissions!

Austin-Round Rock


Bastrop County


Caldwell County


City of Austin


Hays County


Travis County


Williamson County

Interest Rates

Rates peaked around October, but by the end of December had fallen to where many people were getting loans in the high 5% / low 6% range. My phone blew up for the first few days of the new year because of that move downward. The CME Fed Watch Tool was predicting with 80% certainty that the Fed would lower rates in March.

Since that time, we had a pretty bad CPI report yesterday, causing rates (which were already back up in the upper 6% range), to increase even further back up to say the 7% range. Core Inflation, which is what the Fed is looking at, ended up 0.4% for January (compared to the expected 0.3%), meaning inflation is getting worse, not better. While not directly causing mortgage rates to rise, there is a strong correlation between the 10 year US Treasury and mortgage rates. And the CME Group is now reporting that the market has priced in just a 10% probability of a rate cut in March. It seems that the earliest a rate cut could come now is late May or mid June.

Steve posted a good mortgage update on this thread as well.

HOUSTON

"Fresh on the heels of the holidays and despite lingering consumer concerns about elevated mortgage interest rates, the Houston real estate market achieved an unexpectedly strong start to 2024."

FACTS

• The biggest thing I see here is that inventory held firm at 3.3 months from January and December. Normally, we would see inventory climb from January through March, and then fall until August. That's not the case right now.
• Average and median pricing is up 2.7% / 2.1% year over year, respectively. This is a result of the continued lack of inventory.
• All active listings are up 17.8% while single family sales and pending sales are only up 9.0% / 6.3%, respectively. (single family vs. entire market is the key factor here)

[img][/img]

https://www.har.com/content/department/newsroom?pid=2054

MY TAKE

• I'm hearing more and more complaints from prospective buyers about the lack of inventory, and if this continues, this Spring/Summer sales season, regardless of mortgage rates, could be ugly for buyers.
• If rates drop this summer, I believe it will shake loose not only some buyers, but some sellers as well. Hopefully this could help curb the inventory problem. I don't think it is healthy for the market to see double digit appreciation again this quickly.
• I have a pretty solid plate of sellers ready to list their homes this spring. It seems like I have a lot of buyer clients who are not 100% / fully engaged, but hopefully with some more inventory, these folks can find some great homes in the near future.
• I have a decent pool of buyers looking for land anywhere from 1 acre to 100+ acres across Texas. If you have land you are looking to sell, please let me know!

Interesting contrast between Austin and Houston. Thanks guys as always.

Austin Rental Data

Red Pear Realty said:

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Interest Rates

Rates peaked around October, but by the end of December had fallen to where many people were getting loans in the high 5% / low 6% range. My phone blew up for the first few days of the new year because of that move downward. The CME Fed Watch Tool was predicting with 80% certainty that the Fed would lower rates in March.

Since that time, we had a pretty bad CPI report yesterday, causing rates (which were already back up in the upper 6% range), to increase even further back up to say the 7% range. Core Inflation, which is what the Fed is looking at, ended up 0.4% for January (compared to the expected 0.3%), meaning inflation is getting worse, not better. While not directly causing mortgage rates to rise, there is a strong correlation between the 10 year US Treasury and mortgage rates. And the CME Group is now reporting that the market has priced in just a 10% probability of a rate cut in March. It seems that the earliest a rate cut could come now is late May or mid June.

Steve posted a good mortgage update on this thread as well.

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Appreciate all the posts you make on this board. Long time listener first time caller type of post

Long story short: my family is moving back in with my mom next month. My father recently passed and the house is big enough to support everyone/live comfortably. We have the ability to minimize bills and save quite a bit (mom included). With that said, I have a house in Tarrant County that I can sell at any time or rent. The decision has been made to sell just because of the 80 mile distance and not wanting to deal with the trouble of renting.

With news of what happened yesterday on the CPI, is it better to wait to put it up for sale in the summer?

Sister in law/RE agent ran comps earlier this month, so we felt comfortable putting it on the market mid March. Now I'm re-opening the idea.

I'll hang up and listen.

I definitely can't predict the future with certainty, but given the choice, I would personally list a home in April versus March in almost every circumstance. On the interest rate question, as I told a potential seller in person during their pre-listing walk through today, delaying to sell beyond a typical spring listing time for them would definitely be more of a gamble on what interest rates do. And the reality is that when rates drop, the masses will likely be fearful, not greedy. That's my take. Hope it helps.

Take this to the "millennials will never buy a home, everyone else is to blame for how hard they have it" thread on the politics board.

NORTH TEXAS

After reading this In Southwest Florida, High Home Insurance Rates Are Driving Away Would-Be Buyers, I thought to myself...maybe there's an affordability ceiling after all??

However, I think the Florida markets, with the exception of Miami/Jupiter/West Palm Beach are much more price sensitive due to being made up primarily from retirees. How this applies to Texas? For the people that have been for 5-years plus, its painful to see what can be afforded today, however, for the coastal transplants, pedal to the metal, they can still buy anything they want. Time will tell and if corporate relocations slow, it could be a good thing for buyers.

However, I'm not really seeing signs that things in North Texas will cool off any time soon, especially if we get some aid from lower treasuries, the way things look now is that we could potentially start seeing those cuts in the peak of the busy season.

If that happens, I see multiple offer scenarios coming back to the fold (in some places they never left), especially for high in-demand areas (Lake Highlands, M Streets, Lakewood, Arlington Heights, Plano, Frisco, etc.).

I helped out a client this past weekend tour a house in Lake Highlands (priced at $599k) and the home was under contract after a day and received multiple offers.

Same scenario for a home in Arlington Heights priced in the mid 500s.

DFW still has relatively low inventory at 2.6 months, prices increased 2.1% YoY and days on market decreased 3 days to 92. The only counties below that saw prices decrease were Rockwall and Collin, however, Rockwall had been on fire in terms of price increases until recently (some of which was driven by new construction).















Other North Texas counties available upon request

Bryan / College Station Area Statistics:

• New Listing's grew by 44% from December to end of January. For perspective - in 2022, there were 4000 properties sold in BCS. In 2023, that number was 3300 properties sold.
• Most of the growth in New Home Listings have come from the $300K to $399K range, but Average Sales Price is $296K
• 46 New Construction Homes sold in January for an average price of $349K and 84 Single Family Homes sold in January for an average price of $389K
• 159 Single Family Homes were leased in January with average leasing rate of $2070/month. See Rental Stats listed below.

My Take-Aways:

• Since the middle of January - I've had several inquiries from sellers looking into a potential sale of their property and what price to list at. If you are thinking about selling, the best time to list for the Spring would be late March/early April
  
• Deals are still out there for willing sellers and motivated buyers - I recently acquired a new rental property with a 6.75% interest rate AND my annual insurance premium was $1350. Both came in better than I expected!
  
• **If you have rental properties, you need to be thinking about your current tenant situation.**
  
  • You need to determine if your existing tenants are going to stay, if not, you will need to start marketing/listing the property for lease.
  • This is the time of year when tenants start finding new places to live for the upcoming school year.

• If you would like to know what the comparable and market data looks like for your house or rental, please don't hesitate to reach out. Happy to run the data and let you know what the numbers would look like for listing or leasing your property.

Bryan/College Station MSA:







Bryan:



College Station:



Rental Stats:

https://www.cnbc.com/quotes/US10Y/

Temple-Belton

Bryan/College Station data is up!

Beaumont:



Odessa:



Midland: