Real Estate: The Big Picture

Financial investors coach clients to look at long-term results instead of obsessively monitoring daily stock reports. Resisting the temptation to overanalyze is difficult, since the Internet provides a never-ending supply of information. The same is true of the U.S. housing market. Home values and interest rates rise and fall as often as soufflés in test kitchens. And a plethora of electronic information makes it hard for most homeowners and house hunters to resist the pull of property-value and interest-rate related news.

Just how can you be expected to keep a cool head in such a hot market?

Across the country, slow and steady wins the race.

Although Californians used to believe that depressed markets were a phenomenon reserved for other less fortunate states, when the housing bubble popped nearly 10 years ago, real estate agents and mortgage lenders across the country were forced to regroup. Many left the industry altogether. But seasoned professionals weathered the storm – aware that booms and busts are central to the Southern California housing market.

Redlands Real Estate

In Redlands, California, where Keller Williams’ Realtor Candace Cantu McGloin is based, real estate values mirror national trends. For instance, housing prices peaked in the 1980’s and again at the second Turn of the Century, only to plummet in 2008. And resurgence has been slow. One of the reasons for this is because lenders require borrowers to plop down sizable down payments for maximum leverage on low interest loans. Also, most of today’s first-time home buyers compete for low inventory against investors and flippers, who have flooded the modest housing market with cash-on-hand because they inherently understand the cyclical nature of real estate.

On the low end, the result has been a major shift in California from home ownership to rental. But this is good news for qualified buyers who want to move up in the Redlands’ real estate market. Redlands’ property values are higher than the national average, with a median price of $389,000 compared to the national median price of $228,900. So, move-up buyers who have set their sights on high end properties in Redlands’ areas like Sunset Hills and Redlands Heights have more houses from which to choose and fewer competitors.

Real Estate Facts

• 28,400 new and resale home transactions closed escrow in California during January 2017.
• The number of homes sold in January 2017 was 5% higher than a year earlier, amounting to 1,400 more sales.
• 2016 ended with 457,900 home sales in California, which is 7,200, or 1.5%, more sales than took place in 2015.

Keller Williams Realtor Candace Cantu McGloin is qualified and willing to help home buyers and sellers across Southern California. A long-time Redlands’ resident, she specializes in the cities of Redlands, Highland, Yucaipa, Grand Terrace, and Loma Linda but has done transactions both on the buying and selling side throughout Southern California. To learn more about real estate in Redlands or elsewhere in the Inland Empire, call Candace directly at (951) 201-2443.