Spring is naturally a time when sellers put new home listings for sale as more people are looking for a house to buy. Home sellers hoping to take advantage of the buyers new born enthusiasm after the winter period. But this year, new listings dropped significantly in March and early April as the Covid-19 outbreak embraced the globe.
Real Estate Portals report less new home listings
Zillow, inc. reported yesterday that newly listed homes in the U.S. were down 27.1% from a year ago in the first week of April. They reported that the number of newly listed properties usually increases in late March and early April as home buying season starts. This year it’s been quite the contrary as many states have suggested or instructed people to stay at home. New listings in the U.S. have fallen 19% from the beginning of March.
No surprise
We can see the same trend happening on our website with international real estate listings. The number of new listings dropped slightly as well as the number of people who made enquiries about real estate offers.
It is totally understandable that people had other things on their mind than getting a new home. Nevertheless, after the first weeks past we can now see that the number of enquiries is slowly coming back to normal.
Social distancing cooled the real estate market
While the covid-19 outbreak and the resulting social distancing have cooled the real estate market considerably, it isn’t completely motionless. Buyers, sellers and real estate agents have started to change their activities as they adapt to public health requirements. They make 3D Home tours available or make home viewings via video conference.
Therefore, it seems like a good time now for all home sellers that are in a wait-and-see-mood to get their home for sale out there.
Need for new homes is still there
Although there is a particularly strong wait-and-see pattern similar to what happened during past pandemics we can see that customers still interested or actually needing to buy a new home even if they are not going to walk-throughs or able to close on transactions in person. Especially smaller and cheaper properties are in high demand.
List your home for sale
If some predictions turn out to be true and house prices will fall dramatically due to the covid-19 outbreak wouldn’t it be better to sell your house today rather tomorrow?
Don’t wait any longer, list your home for sale today.