Charts and Graphs! August Market Report

Charts and Graphs! August Market Report

Posted inReal Estate
There's an old saying that got thrown around a lot in the movie business: perception is reality. Whether or not something is real isn't of particular importance, it's the perception that it's real that matters. One could take this adage and apply it easily to advertising or political campaigns, but it also applies in a different way to the housing market. What buyers and their agents have been seeing all summer- their perception- has been a shifting market in which there…

Financing 101

Posted inReal Estate
What to Know When Starting Your Home Search You’ve taken the big step of deciding to buy a home. Congratulations! One question though: how are you going to pay for it? Whether this is your first time buying or you’ve been through it all before, there’s much to know about your financing options, so here’s a quick primer to help you make informed decisions. Finding a Lender This is step one, as you will need to have financing mostly tied up…
Charts and Graphs! July Market Report

Charts and Graphs! July Market Report

Posted inReal Estate
All real estate is local, and this monthly report is a resource for those buying or selling on the Portland metro’s west side. The data below is for the areas including but not limited to NW Portland, SW Portland, Beaverton, Bethany, Hillsboro, Tigard, and Lake Oswego, and includes all residential resale transactions (new construction not included). A funny thing happened with the idea that mortgage interest rates would keep rising through the rest of the year: it hasn't been happening. They…

What is That House Worth Right Now?

Posted inReal Estate
In the housing market, knowing where you are in the lifespan of a trend is both very important and slippery to capture. Most of the data you have available with which to analyze trends is backwards-looking. If you're trying to figure out what the housing market looks like right now- at the moment you're deciding which house to buy and how much to pay or how much to sell your house for- you have to know what the market looks like…
Charts and Graphs! June Market Report

Charts and Graphs! June Market Report

Posted inReal Estate
All real estate is local, and this monthly report is a resource for those buying or selling on the Portland metro’s west side. The data below is for the areas including but not limited to NW Portland, SW Portland, Beaverton, Bethany, Hillsboro, Tigard, and Lake Oswego, and includes all residential resale transactions (new construction not included). Well, it finally happened: prices dropped. What goes up must come down (which isn't actually true, at least the "must" part), but nevertheless the June…
Machines Don’t Know What Your House is Worth, So Stop Asking Them

Machines Don’t Know What Your House is Worth, So Stop Asking Them

Posted inReal Estate
In a previous life, my job was to pick the best release dates for movies. Now if you're releasing Marvel or Pixar movies it's pretty easy: Christmas for this one, Thanksgiving for that one, first week of May for the other, and I'm going on break. However, I did not work on Marvel or Pixar movies. For the others, there's a whole lot more research and analysis that goes into it than people think. Being that there's plenty of data available…

Finally, Some Good News for Sellers AND Buyers

Posted inReal Estate
The Word of the Day is correction. What needs correcting, you say? Home prices, which have risen around 15% over the past year. Nobody who has been paying attention ever believed that kind of growth was sustainable, and the Fed certainly saw it as a problem when they made moves that caused a rapid rise in interest rates. Those rate increases- mortgage rates are now about double what they were last year- are starting to do what they were designed to…
Charts and Graphs! May Market Report

Charts and Graphs! May Market Report

Posted inReal Estate
All real estate is local, and this monthly report is a resource for those buying or selling on the Portland metro’s west side. The data below is for the areas including but not limited to NW Portland, SW Portland, Beaverton, Bethany, Hillsboro, Tigard, and Lake Oswego, and includes all residential resale transactions (new construction not included). Hey, good news! Home prices are no longer going up 4-5% every month. The rapid rise in interest rates that occurred in March and April…
What the Hell Are You Talking About, Part 2

What the Hell Are You Talking About, Part 2

Posted inReal Estate
A while ago I wrote about the real estate industry's penchant for overused words in home descriptions, typically written by someone who is too busy selling houses to crack open a thesaurus. Recently I was going through listings and saw three in a row that started with the word "beautiful," which is enough to make me crazy so for my own catharsis, I'm revisiting this topic. Consider this a glossary (in random order, deal with it) of terms you'll encounter often…
Charts and Graphs! April Market Report

Charts and Graphs! April Market Report

Posted inReal Estate
All real estate is local, and this monthly report is a resource for those buying or selling on the Portland metro’s west side. The data below is for the areas including but not limited to NW Portland, SW Portland, Beaverton, Bethany, Hillsboro, Tigard, and Lake Oswego, and includes all residential resale transactions (new construction not included). So, if interest rates are doing this: Why are prices doing this: I'm no economist, but even I understand that at some point the cost…