Welcome to 2024! I hope you had a lovely holiday season. I don’t know how 2023 was for you, but it was a bit of a whirlwind for me. A few fantastic vacations, some great family time but mostly helping many families move to Idaho, and maybe 2024 is the year for you buy or sell a home in Idaho!
If you’ve been following me for a while, you know I like to start my new year off with predictions! And if you’re thinking of making the move this year, or you live here already and just want to stay on top of the Boise housing market, you’re going to want to know what I predict for the 2024 Boise Housing Market.
But before we do that, let’s revisit my 2023 Boise Housing Market predictions – what good are predictions if you don’t see if they came true? I gotta say…my crystal ball must have been working really well for 2023. I was actually spot on for most of it. If you recall in late 2022, there were tons of videos coming out predicting massive crashes in the housing market all over, but especially for areas like Boise or Austin. And while I did predict home prices to drop somewhat, which they did, I also predicted the lowering of inventory due to rising interest rates and fewer homes being built.
I did talk quite a bit about the only factor that could make home prices truly crash and more inventory come on the market being IF we saw massive job losses. Well, as we all know now, we did not have massive job losses, and therefore we did not have masses of people needing to sell their homes.
So, while the 2023 Boise housing market was slower than what we now refer to as the “unicorn years” of real estate in 2020-2022, it was actually quite nice to help people buy and sell homes without the intense pressures of the previous years. Yes, buyers did have to deal with those higher rates, but it also provided an opportunity for many buyers who didn’t have a lot to put down but could afford the payments, like FHA or VA buyers, to be able to purchase without competition, paying over asking, and most even got help with closing costs and rate buy downs. I really enjoyed working with those who just did not have a chance in 2020-2022 and help them lose the landlord and become homeowners.
And as I predicted in 2023, we also helped many cash buyer retirees move here, and of course that is always enjoyable as well, to help them move to a more affordable state like Idaho where their money will go much further for them in their golden years.
So how is the 2024 Boise Housing Market shaping up so far? Well, as predicted in my 2023 video, our inventory stayed low due to high rates keeping sellers in their homes, and due to builders being very calculated on how many spec homes they will build. And that kept prices much higher than others predicted in the face of high rates. Once interest rates hit 8% in November, we did see a couple weeks of a stall in buyers, but as the FEDs announced rate decreases for 2024, and then the rates dropped back into the 6 1/2% range, that kicked things right back into action.
In fact, this has been my busiest holiday season ever with leads contacting me about moving here this spring, and people jumping into action now rather than wait until this summer. And why are people so eager to jump into action now?
Well, as of today, Jan 7 2024, we still have many builders offering incentives, we have many of those homes that didn’t sell before the holidays still on the market, so many sellers are still willing to offer credits to buy down the rate or negotiate on price, and there is a BIG change coming for the 2024 Boise housing market that could make the next 2 months the best time to buy in 2024.
I know, you’re thinking, why would I buy now if rates are going to come down more? Well… to answer that, let’s jump into…. drumroll…. My 2024 Boise housing market predictions
So first, I predict that from now to the end of February of 2024 will really be your best time to purchase a house, because you can still get builder incentives and a better chance at negotiating with sellers of existing homes.
What will happen in March of 2024 will be all of our new spring sellers of existing homes will come on the market all eager beaver to ask as high as they can and not want to drop their prices or negotiate. Builders will drop their incentives, or lessen them quite a bit, as the spring market comes on. So, I know, these two aren’t groundbreaking predictions because they happen every year.
But what doesn’t happen every year is an incredibly heated election in an already very contentious political environment. So, to make things look like the state of our union is all hunky dory, the powers that be will lower those interest rates. So no, they aren’t going to lower them back to 3% or anything like that, but I predict that they will be down into the low 5% range by this summer. And last year, we learned through experience that when the interest rates were in the 5% range, most buyers could afford to purchase at our current home prices. But – just because buyers may not mind a 5% range rate doesn’t mean that sellers will be willing or able to give up a 2 and a half or 3% rate for that. So, while we will have more homes coming on the market due to spring and summer cycles, we will still have many would be sellers trapped in their homes by their low interest rates.
I predict lower inventory than demand. And a lowering of interest rates is one reason we will have increased demand, but not THE reason.
The biggest reason I predict that we will have a large increase in demand is due to fear. Let me explain. The media won’t ever say this, but I hope you all recognize by now that the reason for the mass migrations of 2020-2022 was first and foremost politically driven for conservative people to leave liberal states and move to conservative states. And Idaho fits that bill. And while I won’t even try to predict what political shenanigans will ensue for this election year, what I can predict is that there will be fear. And when fear changes to faith, people make a change. And that change will be, similar to 2020, to move to more conservative states.
I don’t think it will be a repeat of 2020-2021, mostly due to the interest rates being higher than during those years, but for those who can afford our home prices at rates in the fives, they can expect some stiff competition again.
But the good thing in 2020-2021 was we had a ton of homes coming on the market. Of course, inventory was low because homes were selling in a day, but due to the great interest rates, sellers were motivated so basically what we had was a fast and high turnover of homes.
But for this summer of 2024, I am going to be a bit bold here and predict that home prices will increase, and we will see a return of multiple offers. I think that we won’t have as many sellers willing or able to sell as we did in 2020, and that will keep fewer homes from coming on the market, and demand will get high. So, I do absolutely think that between now and the end of February is the best time purchase a home for 2024.
And what about new construction for 2024? Well, builders are pulling more building permits again, so there should be more spec homes available in 2024 than there were last year. But as they’ve been pretty controlled over how many they build, I still think it will be less than demand will need. Once we get closer to the election this summer, fewer people will want to build, and they will opt for new construction spec homes so they can close much faster and with more certainty.
And as far as build jobs go, well, that will be interesting. With a build job, you go under contract about 6-12 months before the house is completed. So, I predict that we will see an increase in demand in build jobs for the next couple of months, and actually, that prediction is already coming true. 3 people I have gotten under contract in the last few weeks have been for build jobs because they are taking advantage of great incentives, and the home will be finished before election time. One builder’s agent I was talking with was telling me how they had nearly sold out of the new phase they opened at the end of December in just a couple of weeks.
And as I talked about quite a bit in the 2023 market predictions, there will be different things going on in the various micro markets. I predict that for 2024, builders building under $600,000 homes will get hit with the most demand, as they already are seeing that, and due to affordability. Interest rates in the fives later this year are better than 8%, but still not phenomenal for how expensive homes are. And I predict that builders in the $800 thousand and above price point will be much slower still than they were in the unicorn years, due to affordability because of rates, and because we have much less of a price gap now between average home sales prices in other, more expensive states, and our average price point here, so people’s equity from other states doesn’t go as far here now as it did in 2020.
And what about predictions for the Boise Housing Market after the summer of 2024? That is kind of a crap shoot. It will really depend not only on who wins the election, but how the media spins it, and what other fall out is happening from the Summer of Political Shenanigans.
So, I am not going to predict what will happen past the end of August of 2024.
But no matter what happens in 2024, we hope you all have a fantastic year, turn off the media, focus on what’s most important, and if that is making a leap of faith to move to Idaho, then reach out, we are here to help you with a soft landing.
2023 HOUSING MARKET PREDICTIONS VIDEO https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RJCGQK-gEFw
Helpful Boise, Idaho links for you!!!!
LINK TO GET OUR MONTHLY NEWSLETTER: https://summerastonrealestate.com/newsletter/
LINK TO GET BOISE MAP TOUR VIDEO: https://youtu.be/K-xWSra013U
LINK TO GET BOISE RELOCATION GUIDE: https://summerastonrealestate.com/relocation-guide/
LINK FOR EAGLE IDAHO AREA COMMUNITY GUIDE: https://summerastonrealestate.com/eagle-area-comparison-guide/
The Summer Aston Real Estate Group is happy to help you buy or sell a home in the Boise Idaho area (also called the Treasure Valley).
Pros and Cons of Living in Boise Idaho: https://youtu.be/U2kOhTZUvRQ
Buying New Construction Property in Boise Idaho: https://youtu.be/jq6TUD5TNfA
What’s the weather like in Boise Idaho: https://youtu.be/4eyPmZtgb-w
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