Tracey Barrett and Lynn Norusis with the FOCUS on NoVA Real Estate team at Century 21 Redwood give their interpretation of where we are today in our local market during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Each Thursday we bring you some information recorded with nice stats put into it and tips and tricks for real estate, as well as just kind of generalizations about the household market. Given the rapidity of the market right now, and all of the changes that are happening, we wanted to bring you some more relevant information about COVID and where things stand.
Prior to March 13th we were having an absolutely incredible market–super robust things are going on the shelf off the shelf, escalating multiple offers the whole nine. Statistics out of the Bright MLS show that we are now down 16 percent in active listings meaning people are not coming on to the market. We are down 41 percent meaning the listings are not coming soon and people might be hesitating to come on the market. With that being said we are also seeing that our pending sales have declined, which means a lot of the purchasers have pulled out of the market.
So the point on this is that although the inventory may not necessarily be coming forward the FOCUS on NoVA team has 9 listings coming up in the next month and a half. There are still buyers out there. Anecdotally speaking, in our actual office there were lots of folks that went under contract this weekend. There is still traffic but the type of traffic is a little bit different. The people that are out there are serious and if you are one of those people who is a purchaser then it is critical now more than ever that you do the right steps to set yourself up.
It is so important to make sure you get a pre-approval. First and foremost one of the requirements that a lot of agents are looking for, especially if they are on the listing side and you’re a buyer going into a home, they are actually wanting to see that pre-approval letter before you even see a property because they want to make sure everyone’s trying to stay as safe as possible and making sure that those people who are actually coming into a property are only serious buyers.
It used to be you had the pre-approval letter that you put together with your offer package, now people are actually looking for those pre approvals before you pay to go into a home just view the property.
Second is you want to make sure you’re talking with your lender and locking in at a really good rate. They are seeing numbers kind of jump back and forth all over the place. You want to make sure that your pre-approval letter is up to date with what is happening right now. And you want to have that conversation as soon as possible with your lender so you are on the same page and truly understand what rate it is you’re able to get right now and what that is going to look like for your monthly payments and then also what that’s going to do for the amount of mortgage that you can afford.
The other thing we are seeing is lenders want to see a little bit more information to make sure that you are a solid candidate and you are able actually going to be able to get this loan. You have to be prepared to have all of your paperwork in order because they are digging a little bit deeper into that sure that these pre-approvals are solid just with some of the info study footing was happening right now in the financial market.
As far as locking in your rate just know that you can’t actually do that until you actually have a ratified contract so do your due diligence. Be prepared to look at the pictures, pull up that satellite image to make sure that the commute is going to work for you and you can go back again do your due diligence up front before making these appointments at these properties.
Real estate is open for business. Like I said, we have nine listings coming up we still have purchasers in the market looking so it is alive it is happening. It is totally unique but you have to be prepared in this post shelter-in-place environment because it has shook everything from the stock market to the mortgage market to the real estate market but we are trained, we are here, we are ready for you and even though the stats look like they’re trending down that does not mean that there are not sellers and purchasers out there.
If you have any questions about Northern Virginia real estate, reach out as we are happy to help.
