I recently had a new client meeting. While discussing the purchase process, my friend asked, “Does real estate slowdown during Christmas break?”
The Honolulu Board of REALTORS® recently released December’s housing statistics. Interestingly, single-family homes and condo sales increased 14.8% and 23.8% respectively from the same time last year. In addition, to no surprise, the median sales price for both single-family homes and condos increased as well.
People are speculating that we could have reached the peak of our housing market. I'm not sure if that's true. As I survey my own clients, it's not uncommon for my millennial, first-time home buyers to submit numerous offers during their home search journey. In addition, new housing construction continues to boom.
For affordable condos, groundbreaking has already occurred for Ke Kilohana and Kapiolani Residence. Just the other week, presales for The Block 803 was recently announced. This condo will add 153 housing units to the market. More so, Hoopili and Koa Ridge are supposed to break ground sometime in 2017. In total, Hoopili and Koa Ridge are expected to add 15,250 homes to the housing market.
What will 2017 bring us? In the past few months, mortgage rate has increased. Maybe that’s the reason why home buyers were actively looking during December.
-RO