During the COVID-19 pandemic, housing prices have been a good predictor for the rest of the economy. By comparing the prices at different times, we are able to see the effects of the outbreak on the housing market. Before the California shelter in place order, the average cost for a single-family house in San Francisco was $1.6 million. The Bay Area’s most expensive city, Atherton, averaged at around $6 million which made it the most expensive place nationally. San Jose’s average cost was around $1.1 million.
In the midst of the outbreak, home tours are off-limits, stagers and photographers aren’t traveling to houses to work. With these canceled, no potential home buyers would be interested in buying the house, leading to more and more homeowners pulling their homes off the market. In San Francisco, the listing inventory dropped about 20% in 3 days. Another factor could also be an increase in unemployment in the past few weeks. An increase in employment from 3.6% to 4.4% has limited people from potentially buying homes. People have put priorities on other things rather than home buying. With fewer people wanting to buy homes, housing prices would also be expected to drop.
Sources:
https://sf.curbed.com/2020/3/23/21188781/sf-housing-market-coronavirus-covid-19
https://sf.curbed.com/platform/amp/2020/4/9/21213948/bay-area-home-prices-compass-coronavirus-2020
This was a very interesting post. I'm surprised that it's taken a pandemic to slow down the Bay Area Housing Market.
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