By: Judy Dutton | Realtor.com
The fall housing market is beginning to show its true colors—and so far, the outlook appears rosier for both homebuyers and sellers.
Real estate is typically seen as a zero-sum game, where a homebuyer’s gain is a seller’s loss, and vice versa. Yet the latest installment of our “How’s the Housing Market This Week?” column finds statistics for the week ending Sept. 3 shining favorably on both sides of the bargaining table.
First, the good news for buyers is that fall is typically the best time to buy a home—and this autumn is shaping up to be better than usual with a bumper crop of homes on the market with a longer shelf life than they’ve had in the past.
“For today’s home shoppers, there are more homes available for sale, and there may be more time to make an offer on one,” notes Realtor.com® Chief Economist Danielle Hale in her analysis.
Meanwhile, the good news for home sellers is there appears to be “a renewed recognition of the relative advantages today’s sellers have,” Hale continues. Namely, record-high home equity, thanks to skyrocketing home prices.
Since the numbers never lie, here are the latest figures and what they mean for both homebuyers and sellers so that all can reap the bounties of the fall market.