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With autumn well underway and mortgage rates hovering around 8 percent, many agents are likely struggling to convince both buyers and sellers to take action right now.
But if you take the time to educate your clients effectively, both you and your clients can unlock significant opportunity in the current market, according to Anthony Lamacchia of the Crush it in Real Estate training platform.
Lamacchia spoke during a recent Inman Connect session about the two most important points to educate your clients on if you want to make sales in the current market.
Bring on the buy-down
The first point you should be well-informed on is the mortgage rate buy-down option, according to Lamacchia. With mortgage rates at 20-year highs, many would-be buyers are sitting on their hands waiting for rates to come down, which many economists predict won’t happen for some time, and certainly not to the lows that prevailed during the pandemic.
If your clients are aware they can get a mortgage rate that adjusts, the current high mortgage rates will look a lot less scary.
“I can tell you without a doubt, no matter who becomes president no matter what happens, three or four years from now — probably even two years from now — rates will be lower than they are now,” Lamacchia said.
This prediction should help convince uneasy homeowners who want to sell their home and buy a new one. If they use a 2-1 buydown, they’ll pay around 6 percent or 7 percent for the first two years of their mortgage before having to pay 8 percent their third year — but if Lamacchia is correct, rates will be lower by then and they can refinance their mortgage.
“That’s the kind of stuff not only you have to talk to your buyers about and you have to be good at explaining to your buyers, but you also have to get good at explaining this to sell-buys,” Lamacchia said.
Fall speed ahead
The second thing agents should study up on this fall are the intricacies of seasonality, and how it differs from market to market, Lamacchia said.
The housing market slows to a snail’s pace during the fall market, and fewer owners list their homes for sale, meaning inventory tends to be lower — but so does competition — before it picks back up significantly after the holiday season along with prices.
“Every single winter there’s droves of buyers that come out of the woodwork and say ‘This is it, this is the year I’m going to buy a house,’ and they get very motivated,” Lamacchia said. “Here’s the problem: So does everybody else, so they’re competing and there’s a lack of listings.”
While demand begins to drop off on Nov. 1 in most colder, Northern markets, markets in the South don’t begin to see a significant dropoff in listings until Dec. 1 — giving buyers in those markets an opportune month-long window when competition is lower but inventory is still available.
“They have less demand to compete with, there is more inventory,” Lamacchia said. “That is the time to buy.”
Lamacchia pointed to two examples in his local New England market. One home in Worcester, Massachusetts, listed for $559,000 in June 2022 and came off the market in the fall after not selling. It was re-listed in January 2023 for the same asking price and sold for $570,000.
Another house he cited was listed in Seekonk, Massachusetts, for $279,000 in June 2022. It also didn’t sell and was taken off the market and re-listed in January for $299,000, before selling for $320,000.
