appraisals

How much is that new roof & AC unit worth?

April 23, 2019 By Ryan Lundquist 23 Comments

“I paid $25,000 for a new roof and AC unit. How much is that worth in an appraisal?” I get questions like this all the time and my answer can be frustrating as I say, “It depends.” Here’s my thought process though and why I can’t just rattle off a quick number. Anything to add?

The full amount: A new roof and AC unit are costly, and sellers often want to pass on the full cost to buyers. The idea is, “Hey, I spent twenty five grand, so the buyer is going to reimburse me.” But cost doesn’t always equal value, and it’s not so common for buyers to pay “dollar for dollar” either.

Boring & bling: A roof and AC unit are definitely important, but they’re sort of boring maintenance items instead of bling. What I mean is buyers don’t tend to visit a property and say, “Oh my gosh, did you see that epic new roof? I’m in love.” Nope, they tend to be more impressed with the latest trendy features instead of the age of the roof or AC unit.

Bare minimum: Buyers expect a working roof and AC unit as a minimum. Lenders definitely expect a roof with a minimum of two years of life also. This is why buyers aren’t always willing to pay big bucks for these features because on some level they simply expect them to be adequate already.

Long-term improvements: A roof and AC unit are going to be an advantage for decades, but a buyer might only be in a house for 10 years. So it probably doesn’t make logical sense to pay for the benefit of the entire lifespan of these items in one instance. In other words, the seller has added marathon improvements, but buyers may not pay that during their sprint to purchase.

Location: An AC unit in Antarctica probably isn’t too valuable, so on some level we have to consider location. On a related note, the higher-end of the price market might react differently compared to the lower end of the market. The truth is buyers in some locations or price points are going to be more informed or picky about certain features. Let’s remember energy efficiency can be a factor here too in light of extra savings.

The comps: At the end of the day we have to look to the market for the answers. I tend to consider all the things above, but I also have to be careful not to impose any of my general thinking on the appraisal. Here’s the key. What have buyers been paying for these features? As we look at comps, what seems to be a reasonable amount that buyers would pay? Let’s study comps to begin to get clues about value.

I know, I didn’t actually answer the question. But that’s not my goal here. My goal is to highlight some important thinking as we try to find the answer.

I hope that was helpful or interesting.

CLASS I’M TEACHING: I’m doing my favorite class at SAR on May 28th from 9am-12pm called “How to Think Like an Appraiser.” Sign up here.

Questions: What point stands out to you the most? Anything to add?

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The booming FLAT market & rate addiction

April 11, 2019 By Ryan Lundquist 9 Comments

The market is getting hotter, but it’s also pretty flat. Let’s talk about this as well as low rate addiction. Then for those interested I have a huge local market update.

Two things:

1) Competitive but flat market: The spring market is definitely competitive. Real estate agents are saying it’s “hot” and they’re right because buyers are hungry, sales volume is up, and it’s taking less time to sell. BUT prices also seem a little flat. I know, that sounds crazy since there’s so much competition, but it’s what the stats are showing. Let’s remember it’s possible to have a market with lots of competition while prices are more subdued or sideways. In other words, just because it’s competitive doesn’t mean prices are going nuts.

2) Rate addiction: Lower rates in 2019 have brought buyers back into the market after a big slump in 2018. It just goes to show how sensitive our market is to rate changes. In other words, it seems the market is struggling to move forward in glory without low rates. Sounds healthy, right?

Any thoughts?

—–——– Big local monthly market update (long on purpose) —–——–

Spring is feeling fairly normal so far and March was actually a strong month. Let’s talk about this.

THE SHORT VERSION:

Price growth is definitely slowing
Sales volume has slumped for 10 months
Volume was strong in March though
Choose comps wisely
I’m now publishing El Dorado County stats
Most metrics are doing what we’d expect for the spring
This post is long on purpose. Skim or pour a cup of coffee.

DOWNLOAD 70+ graphs: Please download all graphs here as a zip file. See my sharing policy for 5 ways to share (please don’t copy verbatim).

THE LONGER VERSION:

Here’s some of the bigger topics to consider right now.

Slow or flat price growth: The median price in Sacramento last month is actually the same as it was one year ago. It’s been a very long time since we’ve seen that happen. Otherwise most other price metrics in the region are up slightly between 2-3% over the year. This is a very modest change over twelve months and it reminds us price momentum is slowing. In many areas it seems prices are hovering around or lower than they were during the height of summer. But keep in mind this isn’t totally abnormal for the spring either because sometimes the new year immediately picks up right where it left off during the height of summer and other times the stats don’t get back to where they were until about May or so. Thus in some senses we’re still waiting to see how this spring market is going to unfold.

A more normal-ish spring: Overall most metrics look normal for the time of year. Prices ticked up again from the fall lull, it took eight less days to get into contract from last month, and there just isn’t that much on the market right now. Part of having an anemic number of listings is normal because the market doesn’t tend to hit its stride until April, but we’re also seeing the byproduct of buyers devouring listings because of low rates.

Choosing comps today: When a market is showing slower price growth it’s important to be realistic about comps. Sellers often want to get super aggressive, but I have some quick advice. Don’t. Give strong weight to similar properties that are getting into contract, and don’t price like it’s the rapidly increasing market from yesteryear. It’s not. Remember, in some areas you might pull comps and not see much price difference at all from the summer of 2018 or even from the spring of last year. Sellers, please remember you are not guaranteed price growth, so don’t price like you’re entitled to it.

Improving volume, sort of: Sales volume definitely made a rebound last month from the profound dullness we saw these past two quarters, yet it was still down 5.7% in the region from last March. And it’s down 7.2% over the past twelve months. Think about it this way. Being down seven percent doesn’t sound like much, but it means there’s been more than two thousand less sales this year in the Sacramento region compared to last year. It sounds bigger when we think of it that way, right? While volume improved this past month, we’ve still had ten months in a row of lower volume, and that’s the bigger story. Moreover, the first quarter was down 10% in the region compared to last year.

Pendings show us the market: Sales from March tell us more about what the market used to be like in January and February when these homes got into contract. So we have to look to the listings and pendings right now to understand where the current market is really at. As of now pendings look pretty strong, which suggests we’ll have another month of stronger volume in April.

Less offers (but actually more): Multiple offers are down about 12% in the region this year compared to last year, but the number of multiple offers actually increased from February to March. This is exactly what we’d expect to see happen in the spring, so don’t write home over it. But it’s still interesting to see.

Price sensitivity: One out of every two homes are getting multiple offers in Sacramento County, and it’s a reminder buyers need to bring strong offers. But sellers ought to price correctly too. Buyers are not desperate and willing to pay unrealistic prices, so I advise aiming for the market instead of that one mythical buyer who will overpay for some reason.

Waiting: We’re waiting and needing a few more months of data to see how this year is going to unfold. It’ll be most interesting to see if we get a little more price growth too (beyond just rebounding from the dull fall). The verdict is not in yet for this year, and there is still an element of uncertainty because we have a market that feels heavily driven by low rates for the time being.

I could write more, but let’s get visual instead.

BIG ISSUES TO WATCH:

1) SPRING GETTING HOT TECHNICALLY: The market is heating up for 2019. We’re seeing price changes, lower inventory, and increased sales volume. So prices are up from the dull fall, but they’re also flat as you can see under #4.

The median price is actually down in Placer County, but I’d suggest waiting a few months before making a big deal out of that since Placer County doesn’t have many sales each month, so data can be a little more volatile Yet this hasn’t happened in a long time either.

2) SLOWING MOMENTUM: Despite the heating, stats show the market is slowing down when we look at the rate of change by year. Looking at monthly, quarterly, and annual numbers helps give a balanced view of things.

3) SALES VOLUME SLUMP for 10 months: It’s important to look at sales volume in a few ways to get the bigger picture. Here it is by month and year.

SACRAMENTO COUNTY:

Key Stats:

March volume down 4.9%
Volume is down 6.2% over the past 12 months

SACRAMENTO REGION:

Key Stats:

March volume down 5.7%
Volume is down 7.2% over the past 12 months

PLACER COUNTY:

Key Stats:

March volume down 5.5%
Volume is down 7.7% over the past 12 months

EL DORADO COUNTY:

Key Stats:

March volume down 8.9%
Volume is down 9.0% over the past 12 months

4) LAST YEAR VS THIS YEAR: It’s been a LONG time since we’ve seen some metrics almost identical to what they were last year. Can you see why I’m saying prices seem flat lately? This may not be true in every single price range or neighborhood of course, but this shows us price momentum is slowing. With that being said, it’s still okay to say the market is “hot”. It is. But I’d say competition is hotter than price appreciation.

Quick note on how NOT to use my content: Please don’t copy my post verbatim or alter the images in any way. I will always show respect for your original work and give you full credit, so I ask for that same courtesy. Here are 5 ways to share my content.

Now here are a bunch of images. Please enjoy.

SACRAMENTO COUNTY (more graphs here):

SACRAMENTO REGION (more graphs here):

PLACER COUNTY (more graphs here):

EL DORADO COUNTY (more graphs here):

DOWNLOAD 70+ graphs: Please download all graphs here as a zip file. See my sharing policy for 5 ways to share (please don’t copy verbatim).

Questions: What are you seeing out there? What do you think prices are doing? What are you hearing from buyers and sellers lately?

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A hair stylist says we’re not in a bubble…

November 6, 2018 By Ryan Lundquist 22 Comments

Everywhere I go people are talking about housing. So it wasn’t a surprise to have a market conversation with a hair stylist while flying to Texas last week. We talked about real estate bubbles and mullets. Anyway, here’s a few quick takeaways and some thoughts after attending an amazing conference called AppraiserFest.

Of course I shared this conversation on Twitter:

TAKEAWAYS:

1) Opinions: Everyone has an opinion about what the market is doing or will do in the future. These days when I meet people I tend to ask them what they think is happening, and I’m always grateful and fascinated to hear responses. The truth is I like to hear opinions, but the bigger issue is an opinion without influence from local data isn’t that meaningful, whether it’s from a hair stylist, economist, or real estate professional.

2) Local data: The only thing that really matters right now is local data. What do the stats say the market is doing? What is the word on the street? What are we hearing from sellers and buyers? What is normal and not normal for a slower fall season? More than ever we need to pay attention and sometimes sift through the hype of doom & gloom real estate headlines too. This market presents us an opportunity to be objective, honest about not knowing the future exactly, and creative to find ways to describe what the market is doing. On a side note I’ll have my big monthly market update posted next week.

3) Mullets: Speaking of mullets, six years ago I helped coin the term “parcel mullet” to explain the phenomenon of having a short lawn in the front and a long lawn in the back. Either you think that’s hilarious or now you know I’m immature.

REAL ESTATE “ISLANDS”

I just got back from a conference called AppraiserFest. It was incredible to hang with nearly 300 other appraisers for a few days in San Antonio. I was honored to speak too. Anyway, here’s a couple of things on my mind that I wanted to share as an encouragement to real estate professionals.

1) Islands: It’s easy in real estate to go about things alone or be an “island” so to speak. But growing professionally and learning often involves intentionally being around people who will help us grow. I know this seems basic, but often appraisers are solo artists and completely isolated. That’s not a good thing, and it’s one reason why it was so powerful to see appraisers come together.

2) Finding people: With so much talk about the market changing, it’s critical to be surrounded by people who are accurately interpreting the market and helping us think through issues. My encouragement is to find others to help you think out of the box when it comes to real estate trends (and being successful in any market). I realize that’s a bit vague, but it’s something that needs to happen. As a side note I read Jonathan Miller’s Housing Notes every Friday without fail, and that’s one practical thing I do to help keep my mind sharp. For me Jonathan is one of those people who speaks into my life from afar and I’m better for it. That’s one reason why it was a real pleasure to meet him in person this past week.

I hope that was interesting or helpful.

Market update video: Here’s a video I did with Realtor Doug Reynolds a couple weeks ago to talk through the fall market. Check it out if you’d like. If you want to do something like this too, let me know.

NOTE about this video: Someone asked me how much I charge to share a video with an agent like the one above. In short, I will NEVER do that. I shared this because I was in the video and the content is worth digesting. I did this video for free with Doug and that’s what I do with everyone. I have a couple more video shoots on the docket and I may share those eventually too, but only if they actually fit with what I’m saying. If a video doesn’t add value or fit within what I’m trying to say, then it won’t get shared. Make sense? Hopefully so.

Questions: In what places are you having real estate conversations lately? What voices are you listening to right now that are helping you grow and think through the market?

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The problem of not listening in a slower market

September 12, 2018 By Ryan Lundquist 9 Comments

It’s not easy to listen when the market is slowing. This is true for sellers taking in pricing advice, and it’s also true for the average person reading national headlines. Let’s talk about this. Then for those interested I have a big market update. Anything to add?

Sellers not listening: All year it seems sellers have struggled to listen to pricing advice from their real estate agents. I guess I can understand because they’ve had nothing but “hot” headlines for six years. But I think there’s another issue too. Maybe we’re seeing some of the effect of sellers having more real estate data at their disposal than ever because of Zillow, Redfin, Metrolist, blogs… So right or wrong, we have sellers who now they think they know better than anyone. Whatever the case, sellers are making real mistakes out there by not listening to pricing advice and instead pricing for a much hotter market than we actually have. In case it’s useful, I wrote an article in Comstock’s magazine with some practical advice for sellers.

Listening to national headlines: There have been sensational headlines about the market beginning to crash, and it’s difficult at times to think past these headlines and be objective. Let’s remember though that headlines are designed to get clicks, and a headline may or may not mean anything for a local market. My advice? Don’t let any headline cloud your judgement of local trends.

Listening without enough context: This sounds like such a geeky point, but hang in here with me because it matters. Lots of times in real estate we end up comparing the current year with the previous year, and that’s actually a good thing. But my sense is we’re missing something if we pay too much attention to last year only and ignore prior years. In Sacramento at least it’s been a few seasons since we’ve had a dull fall, so it’s easy to forget what that feels like. Moreover, if we look at current inventory levels beginning to push a two-month housing supply, that looks huge compared to the past couple years. But if we look at inventory from 2014 when we had a dull fall season, it was hovering between 2 to 2.75 months at the time. This reminds us it’s possible to have higher inventory at this time of year without the market utterly tanking. I don’t say this to diminish the importance of rising housing supply right now, but only to highlight the need to look to a few more years of data as we interpret what is happening. After all, sometimes pulling stats is like pulling comps. If we only look at the past 90 days of sales, that might not be enough. At times we need a much wider view to really see the market. The same thing happens with real estate data. Know what I’m saying?

I hope that was helpful. Do you “hear” what I’m saying?

—–——– Big local monthly market update (long on purpose) —–——–

The market has been slowing. Duh, we know that. Everyone’s talking about it. Let me unpack what I mean below with some comments on some of the bigger themes right now:

Coffee vs. skimming: This post has lots of information. It’s designed to skim until you find something you want to read, or pour a cup of coffee and really spend some time digesting stuff.

BIG ISSUES IN SACRAMENTO:

Prices softening: Most price metrics in the region softened between 1-2% last month, though the median price in Sacramento County was flat. Around this time of year we normally see prices dip (as graphs show below).

Slowing momentum: We know the market is slowing for the season, but it’s also slowing down in terms of overall momentum. What I mean is in years past we’d look at stats and see price metrics were up a good 8-10% over the year, but these days they’re only up closer to 4-6% instead.

Slowing rent: Rent growth has been flattening lately, which is a good thing since rents sprinted way ahead of actual wage growth. Keep in mind this doesn’t mean rents have declined. It just seems the rent trend is flattening.

Sales volume is not crashing: One of the bigger issues to watch to know if a market is crashing is a change in sales volume. In other words, if properties stop selling, we have a big problem. Last month sales volume was down about 6% in the region and 2.6% in Sacramento County. Uh oh, is that a warning sign? Look, this is important to watch over time to know if we have a trend on our hands, but before making too much of one month of data, let’s look to the bigger picture. The truth is sales volume is actually higher so far this year in the region than last year and it’s up 1% in Sacramento County too. No mater how we look at it, volume has actually been strong. This isn’t spin, but fact. Please see my charts below. So on one hand let’s watch these next months carefully because it could be a problem if monthly sales volume does start to come in lower, but let’s also not give laser focus to a weaker August while ignoring the bigger context either.

Inventory is definitely up: It’s really noticeable to see more inventory right now. Even my non-real estate wife has said she’s seeing more listings when driving around town. Housing supply is actually up 25% compared to the same time last year, and it’s literally the first time in three years since we’ve had more than a two-month supply of homes for sale. Obviously if the rate of increase keeps climbing and the market doesn’t absorb new listings, we could have a problem on our hands. But let’s also remember when the market was very dull in the fall of 2014 we saw inventory hover between 2 to 2.75 months at the time.

Taking longer to sell: It took five days longer to sell last month compared to the month before. And this year it took 4 day longer than last year at the same time. So the market has slowed down from last year, but it’s definitely slowing from the past few months too. Sellers, did you hear that? You are losing power in this market and buyers are gaining it. My advice? Price according to listings that are actually getting into contract rather than the highest glowing sales from the spring. This week I talked with an agent about the market feeling really soft in a particular area because listings weren’t moving. But sometimes I wonder if it’s the market or just overpriced listings. From my vantage point almost every listing in the neighborhood was priced 5-10%+ too high, so it wasn’t a real shocker they weren’t selling.

I could write more, but let’s get visual instead.

DOWNLOAD 72 graphs HERE: Please download all graphs here as a zip file. See my sharing policy for 5 ways to share (please don’t copy verbatim).

BIG QUESTIONS:

1) How did the market change from last year?

2) How did the market change from July to August?

3) Is sales volume really crashing right now?

4) How does the current market compare to the previous peak?

2005 vs CURRENT: A few months ago I talked about peak prices because some metrics were showing 2005 levels. But with the market softening right now prices are growing further apart from the “top” so to speak.

SACRAMENTO COUNTY (more graphs here):