Atlanta Real Estate Market 2022

  • 2 years ago
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Despite the unemployment and uncertainty caused by the pandemic, the Atlanta Real Estate Market performed pretty well in the past 2 years. Home prices have tremendously increased and have continued to do so in 2022. But things might just be turning around as real estate is now being driven by credit and as of the last data, it indicated that lending standards among lenders have tightened. There was a drop in mortgage credit availability for home buyers because of the rising mortgage rates. Low inventory and high rates are now putting pressure on the Atlanta Housing Market.

Prices do continue to rise but so as the inventory in metro Atlanta. Having that said, the Atlanta market still remains to be competitive, maybe not as fiercely as it was a few months ago but still basing it from prev data, we are still in a very good place at this point. There was a 34% increase to 1.9 months of supply in July 2022 and we have reached the highest inventory level since October 2020, yet we are still a seller’s market right now.

Is the Atlanta Housing Market Cooling?

Sellers still have the advantage of having a median sales price of $400,000 and an average price of $500,000. Here are some data from the Atlanta REALTORS® Association (ARA)

Housing Demand: In July 2022, the total residential sales were at 5,815, a decrease of 25.7% from the previous year and -16% from June 2022. The number of homes sold in July ranged from 844 in DeKalb County to 1,375 in Fulton County.

Home Prices: High demand is met with a constrained housing market, driving a sustained upward trend in Atlanta home prices. The result is that the average and median sales prices continue to gain traction and outpace 2021’s figures, with positive gains. The median sales price in July 2022 was $420,000, an increase of 15.1% from last year.

The average sales price was $498,500, up 13.9% from the previous year. Among Atlanta’s largest counties, median sales prices ranged from $390,000 in DeKalb to $442,000 in Fulton. Metro Atlanta house prices continued to rise, but an increasing inventory may make it less of a seller’s market in the coming months.

Listing Prices: Realtor.com’s July 2022 report shows the Atlanta real estate market was more balanced, which means that the supply and demand of homes are about the same. A balanced market typically has a total sales-to-total listings ratio between 0.12 and 0.2. The median list price of homes in Atlanta was $435K, trending up 8.7% year-over-year while the median sale price was $395K.

Sale-to-List Price Ratio: 100%, which means that Homes in Atlanta, GA sold for approximately the asking price on average in April. Ideally, a buyer would prefer a sale-to-list price ratio that’s closer to 90% while a seller would always prefer scenarios that can yield a ratio of 100% or higher.

Will Atlanta Housing Prices Go Down?

We are not seing prices to go down and the Atlanta real estate market is too hot to completely shift into a buyers market for the long term.

According to the data insights provided by the Bureau of Economic Analysis, the Atlanta metro area was the tenth-largest in the U.S. and among the top 20-largest in the world (in 2020). The housing demand in Atlanta is still high across the 11-county metro area. To counter the effects of this ongoing crisis, FED did an emergency rate cut which put rates at their lowest level in the last 50-year span.

In a balanced real estate market, it would take about five to six months for the supply to dwindle to zero. In terms of months of supply, Atlanta can become a buyer’s real estate market if the supply increases to more than five months of inventory. And that’s not going to happen. This housing market is skewed to sellers due to a persistent imbalance in supply and demand.

Whether you’re looking to buy or sell, timing your local market is an important part of real estate investment. For buyers in Atlanta, the mortgage rates were at their lowest last year, so they took advantage of scooping up their favorite deals which otherwise were taken away by seasoned investors in the bidding wars.

The rising interest rates are already leading to a decrease in mortgage applications. If you are still able to purchase a property whether for investment or personal, we would recommend you do so sooner rather than later because it will only get harder down the road as they make access to credit even more difficult later on. Keep leveraging the credit while you still can and have that money work for you.

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