Will Austin home prices come down anytime soon?

March 31, 2007

The answer to this question in a nutshell is, no.  By all the trends and statistics, the Austin real estate market will simply stable out or continue to increase steadily.

Austin never was overheated when compared to California, Florida, or other hot markets.  Folks in those markets saw dramatic increases almost overnight. Austin’s higher end real estate did see dramatic increases, but the first and second home markets in Austin saw steady growth.  That has been our saving grace- steady growth.  It is because of that that we are not crashing and burning like many other markets in the nation.

This may sound like bad news, but it’s not!  This fact has allowed many first home buyers to still be able to buy- the home is not completely out of reach.  Buyers have had a chance to adjust to slightly higher price per square foot as opposed to being completely unable to qualify.  While the higher end property has seen great growth in value, it is (to be honest) where the prices should have been years ago. We’re still adjusting, and leveling.

So here is my advice- if you are a new home/first home/second home buyer, you should probably get off of the fence and buy.  I gave this same advice three years ago and honestly, I see people who did not take my advice and are now paying 5.50% interest rates or higher when three years ago the going rate was 4.99%.  Rates and home prices are still excellent, but waiting for something to happen that would swing home prices downward would probably set up a scenario for something much more gloomy.

So get off the fence, take the plunge, make a move or you never know, I may be writing to you three years from now about how you should have listened to me- again.

I was going to close, but let me give another piece of advice- if you’re already out of qualifying, meaning the home you looked at last year is now outside of your qualifying range, take a look further outside in the ‘burbs. Look for brand new subdivisions, and when I say new, I mean just breaking ground in a first phase.  You’ll many times be pleasantly suprised on how much you can get for your buying buck!  But don’t tell anyone else, it’s just our little secret…

Happy Buying!

That Real Estate Guy

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