Hot Home Sales Market But Not Bubbly

  There are dozens of things that are different now compared with 2005, but the most significant include:

1. In 2005, thousands of homes were being purchased and left vacant as they were snapped up by speculators
2. In 2005, rents were low and headed lower because there were more homes than people who wanted to live in them
3. In 2005, almost anyone could get a 100% loan with minimal documentation, and thus had no skin in the game if prices were to fall (as they did)
4. In 2005, few people thought the market could decline
5. Mortgage fraud was rampant creating artificial demand
6. The developers had built (an would continue to build through 2007) more homes than were demanded by the population growth

For all 6 of these, the opposite condition exists today.

1. Vacancies are very low
2. Rents are high and rising sharply
3. Qualifying for a mortgage requires financial resources (for example, a job) and must be supported by documentation, and almost all home owners have equity
4. Many people think the market could go down, supported by articles claiming this is likely (although it is not)
5. Mortgage fraud is at a relatively low level
6. The developers have built fewer homes than demanded by population growth between 2008 and 2020.

     

Brokerage uses VR to get consumers inside houses that haven’t been built yet

Urban District Realty, a Washington, D.C.-based brokerage, announced last week the launch of its custom real estate listing system, PROJETO. This system uses virtual reality technology which allows clients to be put in a virtual representation of a property that hasn’t been built yet.   “PROJETO specifically is for homes that have not been built yet, these are homes that are still in development and that is something that when we did all of our research and looked around, no one else is doing it the way we’re doing it in the country,” Principal Broker and CEO of Urban District Realty Ryan Fiero told HousingWire.  

 

Zillow to hire agents as employees for iBuyer transactions

Starting in January 2021, Zillow Offers transactions will be managed by a salaried Zillow employee who is licensed to act as a real estate salesperson through Zillow Homes   Zillow is set to hire real estate agents to represent it in buying and selling homes, a marked shift from the way the company has managed transactions since launching its iBuyer, Zillow Offers, in April 2018.     Previously the company was represented by a licensed local real estate agent, through a brokerage partnership in each market, on both sides of the transaction.   “In thinking about how to make the customer experience smoother, what we realized is, by having a Zillow employee who’s their end-to-end for the entire transaction, it made the whole transaction easier and more streamlined,” Errol Samuelson, Zillow Group’s chief industry development officer, told Inman. “One person that the customer could talk to and they knew that this would be the person that would guide them and shepherd them through the process.”