Platt Park Real Estate Market Update. Summer 2016
Let’s get you caught up on the real estate market for the first half of the year. Of course the headlines have been all about the housing shortage, frustrated buyers, happy sellers and record prices. Certainly in a broad-brush sense that is all true but a little more interesting when you dial it down to our neighborhood.
First off with such price inflation are we headed to a new bubble that will soon burst? Simply put, no. There are primarily three factors driving the current housing market (and a few lesser ones we’ll not touch on here):
- Population growth. Last year Colorado added over 100,000 people and this year looks to be the same. This growth trend has gone on for years and there is no end in sight.
- Housing deficit. Here is where the issue intensifies. Denver has not been adding housing units at the rate of population growth. In fact there is an ever-widening gap, which has the inevitable effect of pushing prices up for housing. Supply and demand.
- Cultural shift. The suburbs are no longer the cool place to be. Urban environments are the trend.
Those are not factors that lead to price bubbles so don’t expect prices to be dropping any time soon if ever.
So what about Platt Park? No surprise that our prices have been climbing for many years. The home you purchased ten years ago is probably worth about double today but the appreciation has been fairly steady (yes even during the recession). For the last two years we’ve been in a cycle where from early spring to mid-summer prices jump then in the second half of the year the market cools and prices ease off some. The net effect over the past twelve months is that prices have actually changed little. The average sale price for a bungalow in Platt Park is about what it was last year at this time. Because Platt Park was one of the first in Denver to experience strong price inflation we are also one of the first to hit a bit of a price plateau. I think that is a healthy thing actually.
Selling in such a market is a little tricky. Getting the price correct is huge. Overpriced homes, poorly marketed, for all the hot market hype, will sit, eventually having to drop price. Getting it correct out the gate will net you the highest value for your home and you could still end up with multiple offers—the holy-grail of home selling.
Having a local expert at your side to coach you through the process is more important than ever. If you need or want to sell give us a call. No one understands the Platt Park market like we do.
Happy to discuss any of this more in depth if you’d like–give us a call if we can be of service. Enjoy the rest of your summer!
See you around the neighborhood,
Tom & Denise Snyder