April ’22 Market Update

Change is in the air in Portland’s westside suburban real estate market! This is the April 2022 market update, looking at stats from March. First of all, interest rates had started a rise when I gave you last month’s update, but they have gained a lot of momentum since that time. Rates have trended upwards and moved solidly into the 5% range for your standard 30-year fixed rate loans. We’re seeing 5 3/8% for conforming loans right now and 4 5/8 for jumbo loans. So what does this mean for buyers and sellers? Well, for buyers, their money just won’t go as far if they’re obtaining a loan, and they will need to have a smaller purchase price budget now to get the same monthly payment. Cash is king, of course, and will be even more difficult to compete with as rates go up. But the vast majority of buyers still do need to obtain a loan to purchase a home. For sellers, this should mean that prices will begin to level off. And perhaps we won’t be seeing offers that are 20% above the logical sales data-based market values, but we aren’t there yet. We are still seeing multiple offers that are very competitive, so it’s still a great time to sell right now. But you know, interest rates are the pillar that are strong sellers’ market was built on. So logic tells us that the market will begin to cool. It’s pretty well known in my business that we often see a storm of activity when interest rates shift either direction. And so it’s kind of to be determined if that’s what we’ve been seeing recently. Okay, let’s look at those March stats. As I predicted, prices had a strong uptick pretty much across the board. Inventory is at 7/10 of a month. So down slightly from last month, but it’s also good to know that there are contingent sales and short sales that are not calculated in there. So the actual inventory is 0.6, which is basically tied for the lowest ever inventory figures which we saw last year. Here are the March month-end averages. The overall Portland market crossed a new threshold going over the $600,000 mark at 610,900 on average. And that is up 5% from the prior month with 25 days on market. So homes also sold 30% faster. On the westside, Beaverton, Aloha came in at 540,000 with 13 days on the market, Hillsboro, Forest Grove at 552,600 with 14 days on market, Tigard, Tualatin, Wilsonville, Sherwood came in at 661,300 with just 11 days on market, West Portland came in at 694,300 with 48 days on market. And that is the only westside area where prices didn’t go up, which may be due to tax concerns in Multnomah County. Northwest Washington County came in at 805,200 with 13 days on market and Lake Oswego, West Linn comes in at 1,092,200 with 31 days on market. So the westside suburbs in Washington and Clackamas Counties had an average increase of 9% compared to the overall market of 5%. Now remember, that’s a one-month increase. Thanks for watching. If you have specific questions, please contact me, and as always, reach out to me to find out what we can do to get your home sold for more money, for the best terms by professionals who live here, work here, and do this full time and have your best interest at heart. You can also call me if you just need a little advice.