If you’re on the fence about buying a house in Austin, jump as fast as you can off that fence and call your Realtor! It is a GREAT time to buy a house in Austin. With low interest rates and potentially climbing home prices, there is a window of opportunity to capture a great deal, whether you are buying or refinancing. Continue reading for some really wonderful insights from Texas National Title’s Chief Economist David Tandy:
Low rates
Interest rates will NEVER be lower than they are now. The 3.5% historically low interest rates we have been experiencing were artificially created by the Fed’s quantitative easing, and this has been terminated. According to Freddie Mac, they expect to see the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage to continue its downward trend, averaging 4.3% in 2019, before increasing to 4.5% in 2020.
With this, we are projecting a steadily growing housing market. Freddie Macreports, “After increasing throughout April, mortgage rates declined at the start of May. The combined positive impact of low mortgage rates, a strong labor market, low unemployment, and modest wage growth supports our forecast for a steadily growing housing market in 2019.”
Lower rates should give a boost to the housing market, as seen with an upswing in both existing and new home sales.
Rising demand
Austin typically has a high home demand, but we will be seeing an even bigger increase in housing demand as tech companies continue to increase their hiring over the next three years. With Austin’s unemployment rate at an all-time low of 2.3%, job postings continuing at their historic high and the many announcements of relocations and expansions including Apple’s 15,000 employee expansion and Google’s 5,000 employee expansion, demand for housing and therefore the home prices will continue to increase over the long term.
According to AustinHomeSearch.com, “Central Texas REALTORS® remained busy after strong first-quarter sales, with the number of April home sales skyrocketing almost 15% in the Austin-Round Rock Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA) over the same period last year. However, because the median sales price increased by a much narrower margin, results signal market prices stabilizing, according to the Austin Board of REALTORS® April 2019 Central Texas Housing Market Report. In April, the median home price in the five-county Austin-Round Rock MSA increased 1.6% to $320,000. Home sales increased year over year by 14.9% to 3,035 sales; sales dollar volume increased 14.1% to $1,207,238,711. During the same period, new listings decreased 1.8% to 4,018 new listings, while active listings increased 1% to 6,217 active listings. Pending sales jumped 14.3% to 3,588 pending sales. Housing inventory in April remained unchanged at 2.4 months of inventory.”
About the Author
