As we draw near the April 30, 2010 deadline for the $8,000 First-Time Home Buyer Credit and the $6,500 Move-Up Home Buyer Credit, expect Seattle area home listings that are not short sales to increase in value compared to short sales.
Based on what I’m seeing (and hearing from my own clients), many people who currently have offers on short sale listings and who are still waiting to get their offers approved by the underlying lienholders may abandon their short sale offers and look for homes that are not short sales in order to get a deal signed around and closed by the credit deadlines. (In order to qualify for either credit, transactions must be mutually accepted by April 30, and closed by June 30, 2010.)
Whenever you have an increase in demand that affects one category of the housing market more than another, those home values increase in comparison. I expect non-short sale listings to reach a premium in April due to the many prospective buyers who qualify for one of the credits and the typically extremely lengthy period of time it still takes most lienholders to approve offers on short sales.
That being said, short sales are still providing competition in the housing market and non-short sale listings need to be priced competitively – just expect them to get a boost shortly.
