I had the opportunity to watch the 2022 Housing Forecast. The huge focus of the forecast this year is that a bubble or market crash is very very unlikely. There is so much more for us to look forward to, and a number of reasons why they think this way.
Jim Wood
Jim Wood set expectations that the housing shortage will continue to push prices up 10-12% this year. This is not as much as we saw in 2021, but is at a steady incline and is way above our traditional average annual increase in home prices. He really wanted to emphasize and set that state that a housing bubble is not likely. BUY NOW! Mortgage rates are increasing and will continue to do so throughout the year. This is to slow the market, but if they did a dramatic increase it would bring everything to halt. In order to keep the market steady but slow it some. There are plans for marginal increases in interest rates throughout the year.
In line with the expectation that we will have a large increase in price this year, the transaction count is expected to stay stead. They expect 17,000-18,000 transaction this year where we had 19,000 in 2021. Along with the increase in the price of homes, it is expected that commissions will increase with the prices. This is great for the economy because this increase in commissions ends up going back into our market as well. Jim is expecting the boom to continue in the “Platinum” age of real estate. (I thought that was a fun term)
Growth
Salt Lake City was #2 second only Boise, Idaho in the number of people moving in and populations growth. Consistent with that trend Utah as a state was 2nd to Idaho is overall growth. In Utah we have 700,000 owner occupied homes. We are the only state that has never dropped below 60% of owner occupied. The more we are discovered as a state, the more people who visit will recognize what a great place we are to live. That contributes to the mass influx of people and growth. There is an expectation that Utah will increase by 2.2 million people by 2060….whew…..
Median House price was 575,000 in Salt Lake County in December 2021 which is up from $485,000 the year prior.
Chris Nelson
Chris Nelson spoke to us about ways to provide housing for all of the people we are seeing and going to continue to see. He thinks we should have an increased focus on condos, townhomes, and high density living. He provided some great options to do this while allowing us to keep some green space mostly outside of the city. His suggestions were that instead of expanding, we should look at large parking lots and abandoned buildings. Build high rise condo complexes there instead. He also said to expect by 2100 that the area from Tremonton to Nephi and Tooele to Heber that we will have over 10 million people living here full time.
I would love to answer any questions you have about the market forecast. Feel free to reach out if you want to know what is going on in our state.
0 Comments