BOISE, Idaho — The housing market in 2023 had its fair share of surprises. Most things people expected to happen, did not. But one expert said, the long-term trends are actually right on track.
In 2023, mortgage rates were supposed to drop, home prices were supposed to creep back up, and the market was supposed to pick up speed. How much of that happened? Pretty much none of it.
2023 Real Estate through November:
Ada County:
Home Sales DOWN 13.8%
Median Home Price DOWN 7.9%
Canyon County:
Home Sales DOWN 10.3%
Median Home Price DOWN 9.8%
Twin Falls County:
Home Sales DOWN 16.2%
Median Home Price DOWN 1.5%
Intermountain MLS is still compiling all the stats, but if we look at the numbers through November, we get the idea. The market stayed slow. The number of homes sold is down double digits in Ada, Canyon, and Twin Falls Counties. The median price is also down in each of those counties, almost 10 percent in Canyon County.
That would be good news if mortgage rates dropped like they were supposed to, which of course, they did not. They are on their way down, but still up almost half a percent compared to last year.
Very few experts predicted all this, but Debbi Myers, President of Boise Regional REALTORS, said we shouldn't be shocked, "If you take out the COVID years, this last year was kind of right on track with where it would have been."
Myers says back before COVID, real estate in Southern Idaho was way undervalued and it's still catching up, "We had an inventory shortage. That's going to continue for some time. That was exacerbated by that mass exodus into Idaho that was happening during COVID. But it's not an unusual correction for the market. And it's something that long term is healthy." She added, "The market is slow. It's not dangerously slow."
That's because Idaho will keep growing. It's just too nice here, so the demand is still there. And we're seeing more people who have lived here for a while downsizing, or selling outright, to get into assisted living.
Myers reminds us, as she's said a few times on Growing Idaho, that these 2023 market changes were really a normalization, "We're always going to see people buying and selling homes won't be at that breakneck speed we heard and saw for a little while."
Here's some perspective for you. While home prices are down, in the long term, they're way up. The median sales price in 2019 in Ada County was almost $200,000 less than it is right now.
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