Hottest Housing Markets Hit Headwinds
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Rising Prices and Mortgage Rates Dent Demand, Pushing Up Supply a Bit.
Some of the nation’s hottest housing markets over the past year are cooling off as buyers balk at paying higher prices while faced with rising mortgage rates, according to a Wall Street Journal survey of market conditions.
In a number of cities across California, Arizona and Nevada—where price gains have been especially strong in the past year—sales are slowing and supply is rising.
Real-estate agents and economists attribute the current slowdown to rising prices and a jump in mortgage rates, which have made homes less affordable for prospective buyers and a less compelling deal for the investors that have played significant roles buying up cheap foreclosures and other distressed homes over the past two years.
For the 12-month period ending in September, values have climbed by more than 33% in Las Vegas and Sacramento, Calif., and by more than 20% in San Francisco, Phoenix, San Diego, and Orange County, Calif., according to Zillow Inc., the real-estate website.
But lately, those gains have moderated. For the July-to-September quarter, home values in Orange County rose just 1%; in San Diego, 2%; and in San Francisco, 3%. Those were the smallest increases in those markets since prices began to rise in early 2012.
nventories are falling in Texas, the Midwest and the Northeast. Compared with a year ago, listings were down in around half of all markets, with big declines in Denver, where inventories were 26% below year-earlier levels, and Manhattan, where inventories fell by 22%.
Listings were down by 19% in Houston; 18% in Dallas; 14% in New York’s Long Island; and 13% in the northern New Jersey suburbs.
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