It's starting to be "that time" again...
These days feel very familiar. I remember what it was like in 2007 when the market started to feel a little wonky. We had had roughly two years of a frothy market and by the summer of 2007, although properties were definitely selling, something felt 'off.' Some properties were taking longer to sell and some just weren't selling. I distinctly remember this because I had a charming condo in Noe Valley that, by all accounts, should have flown off the proverbial shelf. But it sat. And ultimately we took it off the market. Not long thereafter - in the winter of 2008 - the catastrophic news of Bear Sterns and Lehman Brothers precipitated the fall of the house of cards that was our real estate market.
So now...
Buyers seem to be sitting on their hands again, just as they did in 2008 and much of 2009. It's arguably a good time to buy right now and later this year it will probably be a great time to buy. But I have long believed that buyers in San Francisco are like lemmings: if ONE buys, everyone buys. And if ONE doesn't buy, no one buys. It doesn't matter what the headlines say and it certainly doesn't matter if intellectually you can honestly say it's a good time to buy. If the masses aren't signaling it's a good time to buy, it just isn't happening.
The upshot honestly is...
Don't follow the crowds. If something appeals to you and it feels priced right - and you can afford it - go for it. So often buyers say they want to wait until the market drops further. My former broker always used to say, you only know when the market has hit the bottom when it's too late - and the prices start ticking up again. Alas, history feels like it is repeating itself and we are witnessing - again - the majority of potential buyers in San Francisco just sitting on the sidelines. It's understandable they want to wait out the market - there certainly seems to be a lot of uncertainty out there (Ukraine, inflation, rising interest rates). But if there is one thing the San Francisco market rarely reveals, it's a window of buying opportunity. Trust me: now is the time to get serious about buying.