Buyers or Sellers Market
I am frequently asked if its a buyers or sellers market. Most people tend to believe that a buyers market is unfavorable to sellers because the buyers are able to choose from more homes and negotiate better prices. My feeling is that it can work both ways. For example, if you're selling in a buyers market and also buying in a buyers market, it's probably a wash because you'll also be able to get more for you money.
A few years back, we had a tremendous sellers market. It was not unusual to put a house on the market and have one or more contracts the first week. If you look closely at what happened, you'll see that we started gaining homebuilders in droves. The result is that new construction boomed and the inventory of homes began to rise. When the market becomes saturated, building will slow and the cycle will start over again.
As I write this article, Middle Tennessee home sales have been reported down slightly for July 1999, with 2,455 homes sold and 13,590 homes available in inventory. It also reported that the average length of days on market for a single family home was 70 days. On the surface this doesn't look too bad. My belief is however, that the figures can be misleading. Here's why, the report doesn't break down how many sales are from new construction or how many of those homes that closed, had been on the market ,did not sell and were taken off and relisted later at a lower price to make it look like a new listing. In fact, if you ask most realtors now they will tell you that resale's just aren't getting the traffic required to sell them.
The fact is that whether it's a buyers or sellers market you need to do everything you can to increase the odds of selling. Be informed and take your agents advice.