Understanding the Numbers When Buying in a Low Inventory Real Estate Market
As a homebuyer in today’s market, you’re no doubt at your wit’s end trying to find your dream home.
And when you find a home you love,  you’re competing with all cash offers and bidding wars driving the sales price above what it’s listed for, and many times, even above what the home is actually worth!
While there is nothing you can do to create more homes for sale, you can certainly arm yourself by understanding the trends and patterns in the areas you’re trying to buy in.
While it’s not quite rocket science, there is definitely a significant competitive advantage to those that understand the trends of a real estate market.
Sometimes, being competitive means not looking in the most competitive price ranges in the most competitive markets.
Analyzing Market Trends and Statistical Data
Understanding the nature of the market, and preparing yourself for the journey (or battle) is probably the most critical step for managing your expectations.
One tool that all Agents/Brokers of The Cascade Team Real Estate  have access to is the “Market Snapshot” tool. This tool is also made availiable to the public on www.TheCascadeTeam.com website and is located HERE
Let’s take a look at a Market Update Report for the city of Sammamish, Washington for the date of Feb 19th, 2015.
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The median list price in Sammamish, WA for a 4 bedroom, 3 bath home this week is $1,042,000. The 90 properties have been on the market for an average of 58 days. However a deeper look will show that most “New” listings are selling in an average of 5 days, with the over-all total for days-on-market being driven by lingering short sale inventory
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Inventory is tightening and days-on market is falling. The market is  giving strong up signals from these data, meaning buyers are finding strong competition and are often facing multiple offers. This is a seller’s market.
Supply and Demand
In the last few weeks the market has overheated with sales and pending sales outpacing 2014 by over a +25% margin, driving already scarce inventory levels even lower.
With inventory sufficiently low we are deep in a Seller’s Market zone, so watch changes in the Market Action Index. As the market heats up, prices are likely to continue on a rather rapid upward climb. Already in 2015 prices have spiked 8.7%!
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