PORTLAND HOME VALUES

Okay, okay, so last week I whined and moaned and - with respect to August’s 6.7%  downturn in average sales price according to RMLS - hopefully got much of the ‘crap’ out of my system.  Sometimes it’s good to vent .  With the Treasury Secty and the Fed and SEC and Congress et. al. all scrambling to save us from another Great Depression, it does help to put things in perspective.  I am crossing my fingers now every day for all of us.  But as for housing and Portland’s value in home prices, we still have had it pretty good.  Of major metropolitan areas, Portland still ranks on many lists as being hit much less hard when it comes to real estate depreciation since the beginnings of the “housing crisis” and just a few weeks ago, yet another survey came out that showed Portland Metro as having the 4th shortest average “days on market” time frame for our homes to be sold.  But Wait, there’s more: 

Again, to try to put things in perspective before we all wash away in a flood of self-pity, I went back and researched RMLS statistics for year-to-date appreciation rates in Portland Metro for the past 5 years, as that rate was quoted in the August “Market Action” publications of RMLS.  Here’s the findings - For every single year in the five years prior to August 2008, our home values appreciated at the following rates:

• 2007:     7.8%
• 2006:     9.6%
• 2005:     12.7%
• 2004:     8%
• 2003:     6.1%

Sooooo, assuming you didn’t just buy your home last year and have to sell now, you have done very, very well, still. So, from last week’s column I did promise good news, and that’s just the beginning.  I alluded to the fact we’re in a Buyer’s Market, and this is an understatement.  I repeat what I’ve often said for the last year or so–never in my entire real estate career (since 1995) have I seen such a great time to buy a house, and that’s more true now than ever.

Yes, you can wait, wait, wait and postpone buying a home until you think you have, with surgical precision, found “the bottom of the market,” but that, you’ll excuse me, is a fool’s errand, and part of the problem we are in, both in real estate and in terms of the economy in general.  Most always, when you think you’ve found the ‘bottom,’ it has already passed you buy, not to mention other issues that will affect your purchasing power, e.g., credit availability, interest rates, lending fees, inventory/choice of homes, the status of the rental markets, etc.

So, if you can afford to buy, and you’re able to get financing (and I’m always happy to recommend good, honest, solid lenders with a history of good work ethics and experience), for crissakes, go ahead and buy! The groups out there most apt to benefit are first-time buyers, move up buyers and investors.  And for you would-be sellers out there, if you need to sell–you’ve been relocated, or you really need to get out of that too-big house once and for all, you’re divorcing or have an estate that must be liquidated–remember the figures quoted above.  If you’ve owned the home for more than a few years, you have done very, very well indeed, and will have made a substantial profit in this or any market.

Most importantly, be healthy and happy in your home!

Zach Newman is an experienced, reliable and trusted Realtor in the Portland area. He is an agent for Re/Max Equity Group and he is a longtime member of PABA - Portland’s GLBT Chamber of Commerce. Call Zach at 503.287.8989 or visit his website at: http://www.equitygroup.com/zach.

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