I updated the three Phoenix Real Estate Market at a Glance graphs with August 2015 data.
No clear direction. The market for Phoenix residential real estate doesn’t have a clear direction right now. We’ll know a lot more in December once we see the numbers for November 2015.
Inventory of homes for sale will be the key. I’m keying on the inventory of homes for sale in November. If we start 2016 with “high” inventory I’m betting price increases in 2016 will be “normal”. If the inventory is still “low” in November, we could see higher than average home price increases in metro Phoenix in 2016.
Boomerang buyers and FHA loans. I didn’t mention it in the video but I think one reason that Phoenix home price increases in 2015 have been higher than expected is that an unexpectedly large number of boomerang buyers came back into the market and bought homes using FHA loans.
FHA loans have a shorter “penalty box” than conventional loans. For example, if you were foreclosed on or had a short sale, most lenders won’t lend you money to buy a home again for up to 7 years. But you can get an FHA loan to buy a home much sooner than that.
So my theory is there were a lot more boomerang buyers buying homes in 2015 in Phoenix than previously expected because many of those boomerang buyers used FHA loans so they could buy now before interest rates increased.
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