High-end blues
Lack of movement keeping listings still at higher price ranges
Higher-priced homes for sale are sitting longer than they did not so long ago, but change is coming that may loosen things up a bit.
EDMOND — Winds are still mostly stalled aloft in the housing market, with higher-priced homes for sale still sitting longer than they did not so long ago.
There’s one in Oak Tree that’s been on the market for more than two years.
So agent Beverly Hamilton isn’t sweating yet over one she has a few miles away that she’s had listed for just 90 days or so.
That’s not that long for a 5,000-square-foot place on nearly 2 acres with five bedrooms, four baths, multiple living and dining rooms, a country kitchen, threecar garage, pool, hot tub and waterfall, outdoor kitchen, bar and lounge to rival a college hangout.
But it’s listed for $895,000 — up there smack in the near Doldrums.
“We don’t know why, but we’re not getting as many showings as we would like or are used to,” Hamilton said at the home at 2800 Chaumont, northwest of Sorghum Mill and Coltrane roads.
“We’re having more brokers’ opens and more open houses, and we do that because we’re not having the activity that we would like to have,” she said.
Those who are buying on the upper end of the market are paying cash or using private bank loans, said Hamilton, an agent with Metro First Realty, 3232 W Britton Road, Suite 277.
And, she said, in Edmond, the few upscale buyers, especially if they’re younger, are heading east of Interstate 35, where newer homes have lots of windows and sunlight and come with a couple of acres.
Fannie and Freddie loan limits
An increase in the maximum conforming loan limit for mortgages acquired by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac next year won’t directly affect the upscale market, but a ripple effect could loosen things up.
The maximum conforming loan limit for single-family properties here and in most of the country will be $453,100 in 2018, an increase from $424,100 in 2017, according to the Federal Housing Finance Agency. FHFA raised the limit because of rising home prices.
That means that next year, Fannie and Freddie will be able to buy higher mortgages from lenders, sending more capital back to the lenders so they can make more loans. Fannie and Freddie buy mortgages to package together and sell to investors.
Raising the limit will open a window for lending — and buying and selling — in a price range that has been particularly gummy, those priced between $450,000 and $500,000, said Scott Senner, loan officer with Interlinc Mortgage LLC in Edmond.
The higher limit will make those homes easier to sell because buyers won’t be faced with the higher down payments, interest rates and fees required for “jumbo” loans, he said. “Jumbo” means higher than the loan limit, therefore not salable to Fannie and Freddie, therefore less likely to be funded in the first place.
Reducing the need for jumbos in the $450,000$500,000 price range will make it easier to move into, and beyond, that range. Buying in will be less difficult, so anyone wanting to move further upscale, but needing to sell first, will more likely be able to do so.
Across all price ranges, Realtors in the metro area sold 7 percent more houses through October than in the same 10-month period last year, according to the latest statistics available from the Oklahoma City Metro Association of Realtors.
October sales were basically flat with 1,466 transactions, compared with 1,476 in October last year, the Realtors reported.
The end of the year could see a wall of houses move through the market: October ended with 1,616 sales pending — houses under contract but transactions not yet closed — which was 28.4 percent more than in October of 2016, the Realtors said.
For their part, Oklahoma City-area homebuilders are closing in on somewhat more active 2017 than 2016, according to The Builder Report by Dharma Inc. in Norman.
Through November, builders started 4,315 houses, 7.4 percent more than the same period last year — and just 68 homes shy of last year’s total, which they surely will surpass this month.