With interest rates no longer spiking, housing industry professionals in the south suburbs and others expect more buyers to enter what they say remains a sellers’ market as the spring home buying season gets underway.
The 30-year fixed mortgage rate averaged 6.79% as of March 28, 2024, down from last week when it averaged 6.87% percent, according to Freddie Mac’s Primary Mortgage Market Survey. But that’s still well above the 4.67% rate during the same period in 2022.“They will never go back to those interest rates,” said Andretta Robinson, a broker and team lead of the Titan Group at Re/Max 10 in Oak Lawn. “Those rates were impacted by COVID. These are normal interest rates now.
Hodges purchased his new home at about $20,000 below the list price, after an appraisal came in valuing the home at less than his initial offer, he said. Finding a new home that met the needs of him and his wife wasn’t easy. “We expect the recent trends toward lower inflation rates, interest rates and unemployment rates to lead to a rebound in the housing market beginning in April,” Daniel McMillen, professor of real estate and associate dean for faculty affairs in the UIC College of Business Administration,” stated in the forecast.Geoff Smith, executive director of the Institute for Housing Studies at DePaul University, isn’t expecting any dramatic increases in home prices in the south suburbs.
The latest quarterly data released from DePaul, which tracks south suburban submarkets, shows these increases in median prices as of June 2023, compared to when the pandemic began:• Oak Forest/Country Club Hills, up 48.3%The DePaul data shows these year-over-year price changes as June 2023, compared to the prior period:• Oak Forest/Country Club Hills, up 4.6%Realtors say some sellers need to temper their expectations when pricing their homes.
“First impressions matter, and if your house is a mess that can easily turn off potential buyers,” she said.