Source: Bankrate —
In real estate, a seller’s market is just what the name implies: an overall market that favors sellers over buyers. If you want to sell your house, doing so in a seller’s market means you can likely price it relatively high and sell it relatively quickly, often with less fuss like negotiations and concessions.
“A seller’s market occurs when there are more home buyers than available properties on the market. Put simply, in a seller’s market, the demand exceeds the supply, giving sellers the upper hand.” —Nadia Evangelou, senior economist and director of real estate research for the National Association of Realtors (NAR)
Are we in a seller’s market?
Yes. Generally, a neutral market requires around a six-month supply of homes available for sale. Anything less than that is seller’s market territory — and that’s precisely what we’ve seen in recent years, with NAR’s most recent numbers indicating a 3.3-month supply at the current sales pace.
“According to our latest data, housing supply is still very low,” Evangelou says. “Although there are fewer buyers in the market due to weakening affordability, there aren’t yet enough homes. Housing demand continues to outpace supply.”
However, things may be changing. A combination of low inventory and high mortgage rates have resulted in plummeting sales — existing-home sales have dropped for 10 straight months, according to NAR, with a 35.4 percent decrease in November 2022 compared to November 2021. Homes are also sitting on the market for longer, taking around 21 days to sell in November compared to 18 days the previous year, and prices are starting to drop as well.
“It is very much a shifting market — the tide is going out,” says Ruben Gonzalez, chief economist at Keller Williams Realty.
Kendall Bonner, broker/owner of RE/MAX Capital Realty in Lutz, Florida, agrees: “We’re still in a seller’s market right now, but we’re heading toward a more neutral market, which is good and healthy.”
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