‘Really Excited’ About 2026 Real Estate Market

0:00on the property market and welcome me down next guest, Molly. Thanks so much for that to Alex Vittel, who's the president of ERA real estate Alex. So nice to have you on the show. Look, just when we thought the housing market was turning a corner, we get hit with blizzards and bad weather, mother nature unleashing her fury, and then we get an energy shock by the way of a war. Just give us a post check on sentiment right now, and I don't mean the day that we got this week, which is back which looking. I mean today. Today the market's hotter. It's been hotter than it has been over the last few weeks, definitely over the last year. So I'm super excited with what is happening in the market. I know you want to talk about what's happening today, but the war in Iran is just another volatile incident that happens almost in a daily occurrence within real estate. But what I'm really excited is what the data had shared with us is sharing with us about what happened, but more importantly about where we're going. There were seven data points in this rather lengthy report to me that really stand out. You know, you look at February home sales having been a little bit down year over year.

1:00But when you looked at it compared to January, because of the storms that you referenced, home sales actually went up 1.7% year over year. But there's a great story in price growth to price appreciation as well. The 32nd month, straight month of price appreciation for inventory throughout the country, speaking of inventory, inventory did creep up a little bit. And so the days on market by just a few days, but what's really exciting about what's in the report is not the story about what has been, but what is happening. When we saw rates drop just below 6% the other day, we saw the number of pending home sales jumped dramatically year over year at almost 3%. And when you exclude the two weeks of that bad weather that we talked about, almost every single week is seeing pending home sales increased by almost 3% to 5% year over year. So whether it's a war or something else that's volatile, that's happening in the world or in our country, we're continuing to see great strides in the real estate market. We're really excited about this year. It's great to hear somebody who's bullish, and particularly because you're really seeing

2:04the buyers, you're listening to the sellers as well. I mean, your boots on the ground, you're really getting a good sense of how people are feeling. Obviously, price appreciation, good for those sellers, but I do want to talk about what we saw today. And that is, of course, a move in that mortgage rate up to, what is it, 6.11 now. I mean, that 6% was psychological for this market. I'm just wondering, those who are less bullish than you, Alex, and we'll bearish about the situation, do very much pinpoint that and the affordability situation as the reason why it's holding everybody back. Do you share that view? Well, what I share, I share very a lot of excitement about what's ahead, because what happened when mortgage rates dropped just below the 6%, the median price of a home at 398,000, all of a sudden became affordable to 5.5 million home buyers across the country. And as a result, we saw the pending home sales increase. So even though it is sitting at around 6.1, 6.2%, depending on the day, and that can change

3:06from day to day, what it shows us is the moment that psychological effect, the moment that it drops to that 6% or just below 6%, even though we're seeing increases in inventory, I referenced the video I made earlier, is that inventory is going to be gobbled up like Pac-Man. And so, yes, it's bouncing a little bit, but the fact is it has remained in that low 6% for quite a few days now. And that's just really starting to build up that excitement, and with the spring market ahead, I am absolutely excited with what's going to happen in the housing market. Not only now, but for the remainder of 2026. Yeah, look, and the data backs it up, as you said, like we got with the existing home sales, yesterday. I like that analogy with Pac-Man. I'm just wondering, when you talk about inventory, can you help us address the confusion out there about when people say, oh, there's an oversupply, but then some people say there's a lack of supply. Clearly, it's down to exactly where you're talking about. Oh, my God, that is the nail on the head. When you look at it globally, let's look at it at the thousand, the 30,000 foot view. Yes, inventory is up 4.9% year over year, even increase 2.4%

4:09from January. But when you look at specific markets, it's really a tale of two different stories. So I live in Dallas. I was just in Austin last week for the ERA National Convention. And in those two markets, inventory does remain high. But when you look at cities like or states like Connecticut, Connecticut only has 6,500 homes on the market, pre-pandemic, they had 35,000 homes on the market to give you an idea. Or if you look at like the Midwest, like Chicago, Chicago right now has 65% lower inventory than it did pre-pandemic. And so it really is a tale of two cities. So you could be in somewhere like Dallas or Austin where inventory is high, or Connecticut, Chicago where inventory is low. You know, I know you look at a lot of numbers, obviously, as I said, you speak to the buyers, the sellers, obviously the agents, the banks, and the lawyers, everybody that's involved in the housing market. But I'm just wondering, what metric you look at specifically that gives you a really good indication of whether we're seeing improvement or deterioration in your sector. That's a great question. There's really two things I look at. I love to look at the pending sales report because that really just

5:12shows me what's happening in the future, what's going to be closing, and what we can look forward to in March, April, and maybe even in May a little bit. But what I also look at is what am I hearing from the field? Give you an idea. I traveled 174 days last year traveling throughout different ERAs across the country. I think I'm already up to close to like 35, 40 days this year that I've traveled visiting different ERAs in the overriding sentiment, whether you're in Evansville, Indiana, or you're in San Francisco, or Birmingham, Alabama, or Buffalo, New York, or anywhere in between the overriding sentiment is mortgage brokers mortgage applications are up the agents on the ground or seeing the activity not only on their open houses and buyers coming through their open houses, but in buyers wanting to go back out there and look for properties. Me being one of them, actually as soon as we're done, I'm changing clothes and I'm going to look for my investment property of the year. I try to do one a year. You can't time the market. You just got to do what you got to do. And so I believe in the market enough that I'm putting my own money behind it and we'll be looking this afternoon. Yeah, it's nice to hear some optimism, Alex. So let's wait and see. Thank you so

6:13much for breaking that all down for us and giving us a bit of a perspective and window into the real estate space. Alex Vettel who's the president of ERA real estate.