Looking for Sarasota Homes For Sale? Why You May Be Too Late

Certainly, home buyers want to get their home at lowest possible price. The problem is there is no way of telling when the market has hit rock bottom. There will never be an "official announcement" stating that the real estate market is now officially as low as it can go. The free market just doesn't work like that. Like we've been stating for years now, "we won't know when we've hit rock bottom until AFTER we've actually hit it!"

Well, based on the latest statistics just released by Metrostudy, the nation's leading provider of housing information, it does seem to appear that the Sarasota real estate market is currently at the "after" point. In fact, it appears that last fall was probably the best time to buy Sarasota homes for sale.

The Metrostudy report provides numerous statistics that show the Sarasota real estate market is on the upswing, including a drop in inventory by 14% during 2010 and an rise in closings by 18% for the same year. Not only that, most of the closings in Sarasota happened in the 4th quarter making it the best quarter in several years. We believe these statistics can only result in one thing...Sarasota homes for sale will start to increase in value. In fact, we have actually witnessed bidding wars as of late with one of our buyers purchasing a home in Sarasota for $6,000 OVER asking price and that was on a $60,000 condo…that's 10% of the final sale price!

Obviously, if you are currently in the market for Sarasota homes for sale this is not the news you would like to hear especially at a time when we are also seeing a rise in interest rates. Last fall really seems like it was the perfect time to buy Sarasota real estate as interest rates for a 30-year fixed mortgage were close to 4% and right now they are just above 5%. To make matters worse, all signs point to the interest rate continuing to go up.

So, is it too late to buy Sarasota homes for sale? No, not just yet. The good news is we are not too far past rock bottom. If prices do start to rise we believe they will do so gradually, and while mortgage rates seem to be on the rise, historically they are still very low. With that said though, if you have been sitting on the fence waiting for the real estate market to hit rock bottom, it's time to get off that fence.