I’m going to accept the “infomercial challenge” and say that I have in the past and could (now or in the future) cut a more than acceptable deal in any interest-rate environment, “seller’s market” or “buyer’s market.”
I could care less about trying to time the bottom of the market. This is akin to day trading or playing poker. Using myself as an example, if I’m in the market to buy, I want a “particular” kind of property in a very “particular” location that serves a “particular” need at the stage of my life at that time. I’ll just deal with whatever conditions are present at the time and make them work for me.
I DO think that once past Halloween, buyers aren’t really thinking any more about actively placing offers. The vast majority are now trying to “get thru the holidays.” Then in January, many don’t like the “stale selection.” So they continue to wait for more inventory to trickle into the market. By then (April-May), the market is well into the spring-summer “high selling season.” In addition, buyers with school-age kids don’t want to move them unless they are on a break from school that is at the same time as the break of the school they are transferring to (likely summer). So, like it or not, those buyers with school-age kids are neck-to-neck in competition for the same houses with hoardes of other parent-buyers (“herding mentality”).
If the vast majority of buyers in SD County with school-age kids only consider 3-6 zip codes in their home search, they will find themselves bidding against each other and bidding the properties up in price. It’s that simple and has nothing to do with the “true value or worth” of the property. When you get some free time, see:
Historical properties, downtown condos or those in eclectic, gentrifying and/or well-established urban view areas are not nearly as “school-schedule sensitive” as to the best times to market them because they appeal to a very wide demographic, both domestic and foreign.
