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THURSDAY, AUGUST 13, 2020
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CAMPBELL RECORDER
Local homes selling fast despite COVID-19 Randy Tucker Cincinnati Enquirer USA TODAY NETWORK
If you’re looking for a house in Cincinnati or Northern Kentucky, you better act quick. Houses are selling fast, propelled by a combination of strong demand, low supply and low interest rates drawing buyers into the market despite the relentless surge in new COVID-19 infections. “I’ll pull up to a brand-new listing, and it’ll look like a parking lot out front with all the other realtors waiting to show it to their clients,” said Donna Deaton a veteran realtor with ReMax Victory in West Chester. “If the right house comes on the market, it’s gone in hours, not days. It’s becoming a little bit of a nightmare. It’s super frustrating and extremely exhausting.” At least part of the reason the housing market is so competitive is the dearth of inventory in the local area, forcing shoppers to snap up available properties before another buyer beats them to it. Housing inventory in Greater Cincinnati dwindled to historic lows in May, collapsing by more than a third to just 2,758 listings, compared to 4,188 listings in the same month a year ago, according to fi gures from the Cincinnati Area Board of Realtors (CABR). As a result, buyers have been compelled to make decisions on the spot when they see a property they like and often pay thousands of dollars above asking price to beat competitors’ bids. “I put in one off er for a house at $10,000 over asking price, and I got outbid,” said an incredulous Matthew Montgomery, who’s been searching for a house on the east side of Cincinnati for several months. “I try to keep my searches in the $175,000-to-$185,000 range now because I know I’m going to have to spend $200,000 or more to get it,” Montgomery said, referring to the savage price competition. The 24-year-old mechanical engineer, who rents a one-bedroom apartment in Beechwood, said he keeps a close eye on the local housing market, checking daily for new listings on web-
The owners of this three-bedroom house in Taylor Mill said they had 35 showings in three days after their house was listed for sale on July 31. PROVIDED
sites, such as Zillow. Despite his due diligence, he said, he’s missed numerous opportunities to buy because he was too slow to make Montgomery an off er. “You see a listing go up, and it’s only there for 24 to 48 hours before it’s already pending,” Montgomery said. “Even if you have a showing at a house you might want to buy, you can’t sleep on it overnight. “I always thought when you’re making a big decision like buying a house, you should never make an impulse decision,” he added. “But if you don’t make an impulse decision in this market, you don’t even have an opportunity to make an off er.” While the situation is making it tough for buyers, there may not be a better time to be a seller. Home prices are up across the region, which means most sellers can command top dollar, even without making major improvements to their properties. In Greater Cincinnati, the median home price was up about 8% in June, climbing to $214,900 from $199,900 in June last year, the CABR reported. In Northern Kentucky, median prices rose at an even faster rate, surging 18% to $215,550 in June, compared to
$183,000 in the same month a year ago, according to fi gures from the Northern Kentucky Multiple Listing Service. At the same time, mortgage rates have fallen to record lows – now averaging just over 3% for a 30-year, fi xed-rate loan – making buying a home more affordable, even at higher prices. Phillip Goetz said he and his wife, Jennie, recently sold a three-bedroom ranch in Taylor Mill for $205,000 – about $5,000 over the list price. He said the house was shown to prospective buyers 35 times in three days but yielded just two off ers. “I think a lot of people were hesitant to make an off er because they thought they might get caught up in a bidding war,” Goetz said, noting that interested buyers swarmed the house the day it was listed on July 31. “I wasn’t there,’ he said “But my neighbor said an hour after the house was listed there were people parked up and down the street. It was crazy.” According to housing market tracker Redfi n, “Hot Homes” in the Cincinnati metro area are selling for about about 2% above list price and are pending in just over a month, on average. But those fi gures include higherpriced luxury homes that don’t sell as fast because there aren’t as many buyers in the $500,000-and-up price range.
In the hottest Cincinnati-area markets, move-in ready homes priced around $300,000 or less rarely sit on the market for more than three weeks, based on fi gures compiled by ReMax Victory for the top 10 neighborhoods in the Cincinnati area with the highest sales volume so far this year. The latest sales trends come as a welcome-but-unexpected surprise for local realtors who anticipated a housing slowdown caused by the COVID-19 crisis. Many housing experts forecasted June home sales to continue a downward spiral as the fallout from COVID-19 continued to keep wary consumers out of the market and even led some sellers to pull or postpone their listings, The Enquirer reported. Sales in the Cincinnati area were down more than 25% through April and May, compared to the same two months of 2019, according to Kelly Meyer, President of the Cincinnati Area Board of Realtors. But sales rebounded in June, and were down just (7%) from a robust month for home sales in June 2019, Meyer said. “June’s performance was a welcome reversal from those downward trends,” she said.
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