January real estate trends for the greater Cincinnati market seem to match past Januarys in our area.

Shrinking number of homes for sale.  New listings hitting the market and in some cases, selling within days.  As the number of homes listed gets smaller so does the pool of buyers.  Weird scenario where discouraged buyers don’t want or cannot afford to get into bidding wars and are staying out of the market.  On the other hand potential sellers are hesitating to market their homes because they can’t find something to buy.

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Single family home sales volume for the 4 counties. Data pulled from the CincyMLS.

3 of the counties start 2016 ahead of last year.  Only Warren County remained below January 2015 in gross sales volume.   It’s early in the year and way too soon to predict whether 2016 will be better than 2015.  National elections always seem to throw the real estate market off a little and this year will most likely experience some bumps.  Don’t have a good explanation as to why the presidential elections have this effect- maybe too many people are glued to the debates?

Until now our winter continues to be relatively easy of course snow is predicted for this week).  Interest rates are still very low – so we should expect a fair amount of buying and selling in the coming months.  Once again the watchdogs are warning of higher interest rates and more stringent credit requirements in the future but potential buyers shouldn’t be scared away by predictions.  Qualified buyers will be able to buy and when they think they’ve found the right property – purchase contracts are written.  However if the greater Cincinnati area doesn’t see an uptick in new listings soon -buyers may decide to rehab/update and stay in place.

Do you have questions about sale prices in your neighborhood-send a request for a full market evaluation.  Anything else – Call/Txt