SALT LAKE CITY -- According to a study released by realtor.com on the top ten home buying markets for next year, Las Vegas is number one , Salt Lake City is number six, and Tulsa, Oklahoma is number ten.
It also reports the 2017 home price growth was higher than next years will be - making buying homes more affordable.
- 2017: 5.5 percent price increase
- 2018: 3.2 percent price increase
Salt Lake real estate agents agree with the prediction on how Salt Lake City will perform in the housing market in 2018.
“Salt Lake has been dynamite,” said Salt Lake Valley realtor Joel Carson who has been selling homes in Utah for 27 years. “It has been one of the hottest cities in the country. A lot of businesses are moving into town and it brings a lot of buyers in different price ranges. Once they come here, they fall in love with the area the mountains and the people.”
He said Salt Lake Valley home prices might seem high but they are finally becoming nationally competitive.
“I think that Salt Lake has been a little bit of a depressed market in prices being behind the rest of the nation,” Carson explained. “And we are finally catching up. People are surprised with the prices in the valley now. They think they are very high in reality they are just catching up with the rest of the nation. Our average sales price is around $350,000. We are starting to see price-per-foot, which a lot of people focus on, and price-per-foot is nearing $300 in the downtown area. For the southern part of the county we are in the $125 per-foot range. As you move north towards prices downtown they definitely increase. Those have increased fairly modestly I’d say seven to eight percent per year.”
Carson also said with leveled interest rates buyers are not as reluctant to purchase but inventory is the challenge lately.
“I am starting to see a swing back to the buyer's side of the market,” Carson said. “We are starting to see prices drop slightly, which is a good thing for buyers. I think that will make them very happy. There is definitely still a vacuum in the market- lack of inventory, like I said, a lot of people are moving here to fulfill the needs of corporations moving here the Silicon Slopes in Lehi – it’s a big thing and I think the market will continue to rise. When you’re out there every day, and I am previewing over 400 homes a month, so, I am in the homes and I am negotiating with my clients and where we are seeing sellers finally giving in a little on price. It’s definitely moving the direction of becoming a more balanced market instead of the pendulum being way over on the seller's side.”
Click here for more details on the 2018 Housing Forecast.
