Real Estate Heating Up in Laguna Niguel

Things are heating up, and I don’t mean the or the hot muggy weather.

A normal year in real estate has a hot spring “buying season.”  I think we missed it or maybe it just took a long time for the buyers to come out of hibernation.  We keep hearing the national news talk about super high inventory levels for homes.  We don’t see that in Laguna Niguel. 

There are currently 393 total homes on the market in Laguna Niguel and 185 of those are detached homes. There are seven bank-owned homes on the market earlier this week and there were 21 closings of bank-owned homes in the last quarter. This means there is one month of REO inventory. 

For short sales there are 42 detached homes and 35 closed in the last three months. That is equivalent to 3.5 months of inventory.  Buyers’ or sellers’ market? There are 185 standard sales available for detached homes of all prices.  About 25 per month closed in the last quarter. Whoops! That is a buyer’s market with 7.4 months inventory. 

Why do we think Laguna Niguel real estate is heating up? Because of the great interest rates. Last November you could get 4 percent 30-year-fixed rates and by January the rates were up to 5.3 percent. Buyers were in no rush to buy in the first quarter but with the softening rates the spring buying season is starting to appear even though it is summer. Remember, if the prices of homes go down 10 percent and the rates go up 1 percent then your payment is the same in both cases.

Buy a home before school starts!