Home shoppers find no relief as 2021 starts with skyrocketing prices
Central Ohio’s housing market is starting 2021 the same way it left 2020: With skyrocketing prices and a drastic shortage of homes.
Many home shoppers continued to be left out in the cold during January, as the number of home sales rose while the number of listings shrank.
During the first month of the year, 1,926 central Ohio homes changed hands, 10% above last January. At the same time, the number of homeowners who listed their homes fell 9% from a year ago.
The result: a continued decline of available homes, leading to intense bidding wars and leaping prices.
The median sales price of a Columbus-area home was $225,000 in January, up $28,000, or 14.2%, from a year ago.
By the end of January, 1,820 homes were listed in central Ohio, about half the number a year earlier. By contrast, five years ago, shoppers could have picked from 5,795 Columbus-area homes – three times the number they must choose from now.
“It’s common knowledge that we don’t have enough homes for sale to meet the demand,” said Michael Jones, this year’s president of the Columbus Realtors trade association.
“Ten years ago, we were selling just under half of the new inventory,” he said. “In 2020, we were selling 93 percent.”
The pace of new homes being built also is not keeping up with demand, recent data show.
For existing home sales in central Ohio, those that sold in January had been listed an average of 25 days, down from 41 a year ago. But many homes land in contract within a few days of being listed, as sellers seek “highest and best offers” after allowing brief showings for lines of shoppers.
Home buyers hoping for a break in 2021 aren’t likely to find it, as low interest rates, pandemic concerns and simple demographics work against them.
“The factors that contributed to a surge in buyer demand in the latter half of 2020 are still very much in play in early 2021,” said Zillow Economist Matthew Speakman in a news release.
“Mortgage rates spent most of January at or near record lows, and the wave of 20- and 30-somethings aging into their prime homeownership years continued to swell. These factors, combined with many buyers reconsidering their housing needs amid the pandemic, helped stoke red-hot competition for homes that became the norm in 2020, pushing prices skyward.”
The story is much the same across Ohio and the nation. Statewide, sales rose 8.8%, and prices jumped 14.8% in January.
“The start of a new year shows a housing marketplace that has no indication of slowing,” said Ohio Realtors President Seth Task.
Nationally, home sales leapt 23.7% from a year ago while prices climbed 14.1%, according to the National Association of Realtors.
@JimWeiker
Read More: Home shoppers find no relief as 2021 starts with skyrocketing prices