Yes, it’s that time of year again here in the Phoenix Valley for the real estate market. Our market typically (the key word here is ‘typically’) starts to pick up in early to mid March as temperatures consistently start to hoover in the mid 70’s to low 80’s.
Am I seeing increased activity right now? Absolutely! It was been a busy past two weeks as buyers are starting to get off the fence and take advantage of the depressed market. This is especially true with bank owned foreclosures and short sales. I think this trend will continue through the spring, however the real question is if it is sustainable?
I am encouraged by what Bernanke said on the recession ending in 2009, Citigroup being profitable in the first two months of 2009 and also I’m starting to see the Obama foreclosure prevention plan limit the number of homes being foreclosed on. The first place these foreclosures show up is at trustee sales and lately the inventory has been slim with a lot of postponements. It is a simple supply and demand issue for prices to start going up…and if the supply is dropping and the demand is increasing, then prices will find the bottom.
Lastly, I think the Phoenix real estate market will start to recover before a lot of other areas in the country. This being because our market started declining before a lot of other markets (late 2005) and we now have builders that are not in play anymore as well as a consistent population increase…all good things.
