Podcast - 9/8/23

I'm Tom.

I'm Jay Day,

And the Day Home Team of Real Estate Teams with our weekly real estate podcast. Might as well say right now, listening to this today on Friday, come see us tomorrow in downtown Frederick and in the street, right?

Yes. Yes. For the millionth year. It seems we'll be down there sweating and

Second and market. Yeah, the weather looks like it's going to be semi-normal, not like the past week. But like 11 till five. Solid fun. Meet Jay right downtown. Just listen to WFRE. You'll find out all about it. What's happening in the industry, buddy.

Alright, man. So the last podcast I did, Andy and I worked on, but we could not give you stats for September because we did not have enough time to get the statistics in. So let's talk about what's going on in the area. So first we'll talk about Frederick County. Frederick County, when we're looking to see what's happening, it looks like inventory is increasing a little bit. We went up from 141 to 155 homes that are available. Contracts went down from 302 to 275. Sold homes are staying in that upper two range, 289. It was 296 before. Now, of those, this is interesting, 55.76% of those sold above list price. So again, we're still seeing more than half the homes in Frederick County are selling for over asking price. Now, below list price, we're looking at 20.45%, so 20.45 and then sold at list 23.79. Realistically, if you're looking at homes in Frederick County, the odds are more than half sell for over asking. And then one of the other stats we'd like to show is how many homes sold with seller help. So seller help means that the seller pays some of the buyer's closing cost. There were 30 of those, so that equaled 11.15% of the homes on the market. So very little odds of getting seller concessions if you're trying to buy in Frederick County. And the big number we look at again is how many active homes do we have? We've got 155, 275 went under contract. So in Frederick, we are still well under a month's supply of inventory. Now, when we go over to Carroll County coming soon homes, we've got 33. Active 99. Contract 149. So when you add the coming soon and with the active, we're getting close to almost a month supply, but still not there. Sold 151. When we look at homes that had seller help, we are at 31, last time we were at 45, so we're ranging about 20.58%. Again, the market is still strong in those areas. When we look at days on market, and I didn't talk about that in Frederick. But for what went under contract, we went from seven days to 10 days in Carroll County. Let me just quickly go back to Frederick. We went from six days to seven days for homes that went under contract.

I mean, that's pretty much, it's pretty tight, but it's always fascinating because the fluctuation amazes me.

Yeah. Now Washington County, 168 active homes and contracts 154. So we are a little over. We finally tipped over that point of having a month supply of inventory in Washington County. Now, the homes that went under contract, they went from, well, it's 12 days from nine days, so still within two weeks, that's still very quick. For homes that sold were at 150. Last time we ran numbers, we were at 140. So again, still strong demand now homes with seller help, it ended up being 26.67%. So your best odds in the state of Maryland of getting closing help in Washington County. One of the important things I wanted to point out though was in Washington County, when we're looking at what went under contract, the contract prices, the median price the month prior was 285 or 283. This past month, they're 311.

Yeah, man, I knew that was going to happen one day fast.

So now let's go over to Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania, Adams County. Adams County always has a smaller amount of homes on the market. We are at 97, however, only 98 under contract. So we are just a tad over a month supply or at a month supply in Adams County. We look at what went under contract 98, sold 88. Days on market for the homes under contract, it went from nine days to eight days. So even though it's a month's supply, if they're priced right, they're still selling quickly. And homes that had seller help, 18.18%. So again, a small opportunity to get some potential closing help and Adams County. Then we'll go to Franklin. Franklin County, we've got 142 homes that are active. Under contract 192. What sold was 120. For the homes that are under contract, we went from 15 days to 14 days. So again, we're in a situation two weeks, they're going to move if you price 'em right.

I have a question, sir. When you mentioned seller help, is that any different in Maryland and Pennsylvania?

It is. So technically the closing costs are more in Maryland than they are in Pennsylvania. So people that are buying in Maryland are going to need more closing costs than they would in Pennsylvania and also in West Virginia.

Thank you for the explanation. That's why we're here.

So Franklin County, we were at 24.17% of the homes that sold in the last 30 days actually gave seller help. So pretty good odds out there compared to what we've seen in the past. But again, inventory is still an issue. Let's go over to West Virginia. West Virginia, we're looking at Jefferson County, 61 homes that are active on the market with 69 that went under contract. The homes that went under contract, the median days on market was nine days. The homes that sold were up from 54 to 57. We're looking at a median price for the homes that are under contract and sold at 359. So that's holding steady. Homes that had seller help, it was 24.56% of the homes got seller help. Now, to finish it out in Berkeley County, we've got 142 homes that are active, 200 homes under contract. The homes that are under contract, we went from 11 days on market to nine days on market. So the pace is picking up. Sold, we're at 148. Again, when we look at those numbers, that's a really tight. 200 homes under contract, only 142 active. We definitely are not at a month's supply of inventory. And shockingly, the closing help, 33.78% of people, buyers ended up getting some seller concessions out in Berkeley County. That's the highest percentage we have of all the areas that we're recovering, and I mean the big thing is, and what I'll put out there, I didn't get into all the pricing, we are still seeing pricing increasing. It's just increasing at a slower rate. We're thinking we're looking at, instead of a 15% increase, it's closer to 1% or maybe a little under, but so we're still appreciating interest rates are still going up. So the one thing that did stand out to me when I was pulling these stats is a lot of the homes that are selling now are the ones at the lower price because they're more affordable. Because at a 7% interest rate, if you're buying a house for 800,000, that's going to be a nice hefty mortgage payment that you're covering every single month. So we are seeing that the homes that are in the more affordable range are flying off the shelves. They are having multiple offers, and I will tell you, I mean even there's still hotspots. For example, I had one over near Whittier. We put it on the market for six and a quarter. We had a ton of activity. I can't give the details on what it sold for because it hasn't closed yet, but it was a frenzied activity of people trying to get in and to get written. We had another one in Brunswick that somebody bought site unsold because that one was the low threes.

And there was frenzied activity. Lots of inquiries when something like this comes up.

Oh yeah and then people upset, that, hey, how did it sell before it went on the market? Well, if somebody writes an offer, our job is to present it. So another agent sent me an offer. We present it to the seller. The seller makes that decision. Do they want to go on the market or do they want to take something that's a sight unseen? It's totally up to them. It's not our place as agents to tell them to take it or not take it. It's always interesting because you see agents get all frenzied and bothered when homes sell when they're in coming soon. Ultimately, it's up to the seller what they do.

Absolutely, it's their property.

Yeah. It's up to the seller. If they want to accept beforehand, if the seller wants to accept an offer, the day the home hits the market. If the seller wants to set a deadline, if the seller sets a deadline and decides they want to take a contract before the deadline because the terms are so good, we are not, I try and behave myself here. There's no entitlement here. Just because you want to see the house doesn't mean that, it's up to the seller. The seller makes that decision and they have to do what's best for them and or them and their family.

You work for the buyer or the seller. Correct. Simple as that.

Yeah, and I'll tell you, if you're working with one of our buyer agents, we will tell you. Yes it says that there's a deadline. However, we do not want to waste time. If there's a deadline and it's Sunday and we saw it Friday and they want to write on it, we write on it Friday and submit it over because again, the seller can change their mind at any time. Let's say that there's such an amazing offer. I'll give an example. Let's say somebody offers $25,000 more than what it's listed for. Waives every inspection and waives the appraisal. What are you going to hold out?

What do you do? Yeah, no,

Sometimes. And we tell the sellers, it's not our place to tell you what to do. Here's the good and the bad. Here's what could happen. Here's what couldn't happen, and here's where we are now. So let's look at what we have in hand, and then we can speculate all we want, but speculation is we don't know what's going to happen.

Speculation is a sucker bet. We got a home of the week, buddy.

We do, man. 2257 East Mayberry Road in Westminster. This is a cute farmette 5.45 acres. The home has an in-ground pool, fence pasture, a barn, nelson automatic waterers for either your horses, your cattle, whatever it is that you want to have. Four bedrooms, two full bathrooms, two half bathrooms. The home was freshly painted. They recently sanded and refinished the hardwood floors. There's a huge family room with fireplace that has a wood stove insert. Granite countertops, newer appliances in the kitchen, a pellet stove in the basement. Two zoned HVAC system, a great sunroom, finished basement. Basically, this home has it all listed at 650,000. If you want to check it out, go to wfre.com. Look up Tom and Jay's real estate podcast. We have lots of photos. If you like what you see, you can click on the button to schedule a private tour and we can get one of our agents in there. Or if you already have your agent, all your agent needs to do is schedule the showing. And thank you for tuning in.

I'm Tom.

I'm Jay.

Thank you as Jay said for listening and tell your friends all about it. Go Ravens.