What’s Happening in the Atlanta Housing Market?

Folks are starting to ask about the Atlanta housing market.  The election is over and now Atlanta home owners (and home buyers) are starting to look towards 2013.  What should you expect if you plan to sell your home in 2013?

For starters, Atlanta is somewhere around the class average in terms of the National real estate market.  We are doing better than half the class but are still way behind the leading national markets.  Atlanta struggled with foreclosures for a far longer time than most of the US.  And Atlanta still has sub-markets with plenty of foreclosures.  I am fortunate to live and work in a market where foreclosures are dwindling at a rapid rate.  You will have to look hard to find a foreclosure home in the neighborhoods around Emory and CDC.  But if you look for a foreclosure in Southwest Atlanta, Clayton County, parts of Gwinnett – you can still find them in abundance.

 

 

Competition from Builders is on the way.  Builders are starting to crank up their construction programs and are creeping back into the marketplace.  North Atlanta suburbs are seeing this activity now.  2013 will surely see builders moving back to Intown markets.

The Atlanta economy is still holding us back.  There has not been a substantial change in Atlanta employment numbers and certainly no indication new jobs will be created in Atlanta in 2013 in the kind of numbers that will have a big effect on housing.  It is the lack of job creation that will have the greatest impact on housing values in 2013.  I just don’t see significant changes in house values until the demand created by new jobs hits the marketplace.

Public Schools are not making the job creation task easier.  The cheating fiasco in Atlanta Public Schools, the financial mismanagement in DeKalb Public Schools and even the squabble over the school calendar in Cobb County make the Public Schools much less desirable to the kind of large corporate entities that have relocated to Atlanta in the past.

Transportation is also a sore topic for housing.  The lack of public will to address our transportation grid lock and the failure of MARTA to spend money prudently has led to an unfortunate bias against mass transportation.  And new roads are out of the question given the lack of public will to prioritize road construction based on the greatest good for the greatest number of commuters.  Poor transportation planning has the same effect as lack of management in public schools.

If you are a house seller in 2013, anticipate a market that is slightly improved over 2012.  We have a solid housing market but it is not thriving.  There is no way you are going to sell your house for a value that comes anywhere close to pre-2008 levels.  Chill out and take the “loss” as you can turn around and purchase your next home for a solid value.

Home buyers and Investors who are looking to enter the housing market and score one of those deals where the house is priced at 50% below the market – you need to come up with another plan.  The distressed sale homes have mostly cleared the market and home sellers are not going to give their home away.  You missed your window of opportunity.  Expect to pay market value for a home.  Making a low ball offer just ticks off the seller and you will not get the deal of a lifetime.  What you will get is a solid value and potentially an opportunity for modest annual growth in the value of the home you purchase in 2013.

Sally’s Market Projection: The housing market in 2013 will be more stable than we have seen in the past five years.

Call me at 770-939-3174 if you are thinking about buying or selling an Atlanta Georgia home.