If you have been thinking about listing your home with a real estate agent you might want to think again. Qualified buyers are scarce and if your home needs work it may be nearly impossible for a buyer to obtain a loan for the property. If you want to sell your home without the hassle of listing it and waiting, inspections, repairs, appraisals and low-ball offers contact Saint Louis Home Buyers today!! We will buy your home in cash, pay top dollar and close on a date that you pick. Its that easy. Read the CNBC article below to see why home sales will again struggle in 2014.
The severe winter weather has been a convenient scapegoat for the slowdown in the housing market. While many analysts and builders predict a significant pickup in activity in the spring, slack demand may continue to define an uneven recovery—even as green grass replaces ice in the coming months.
Warmer weather could certainly get more people out looking, but with monthly payments potentially much higher this year, new buyers will have to clear a high bar.
“There must be low demand—that’s what we’re seeing,” said Glenn Kelman, CEO of Redfin, an online real estate brokerage based in California. “We saw a huge spike in demand last year, which is why we were so confident the market had bottomed. … We’re not seeing the same thing this year, so even though there aren’t many homes for sale, there aren’t many buyers looking for them, either.”
Affordability, which was so favorable after the housing crash, dropped dramatically last year. Home prices rose from 6 to 14 percent, depending on different readings and whether or not distressed properties were included.
Suffice it to say, prices were up far more than historical appreciation, driven by all-cash investors on the low end and by returning midrange demand. Mortgage rates also jumped a full percentage point last year.
“When you have a 14 percent [price] gain and then a 1 point increase in mortgage rates working together, that will discourage some buyers, but there has also been a more fundamental shift in the psychology of the homebuyer,” Kelman said. “Now you have folks who are very wary of what happened between 2008 and 2013. … They’re not going to buy a home and then feel like a sucker.”