How do you know if your housing market has reached the bottom?

November 20, 2008

All markets are different. During the next few years, some housing markets will turn around faster than others. How do you know when your particular market has reached its bottom? If you wait until others pick over the great deals, you'll miss the bottom.

Keep a track of how many properties are listed from month to month. Once you start to see a reduction in inventory then that may mean that buyers are starting to buy. There could be two reasons whey inventory is reducing – overpriced homes may be taken off the market and sales volume could be picking up. You can find out this information from your local real estate agent.

Keep reading national and local newspapers. If your local media reporters are now starting to interview experts in your market and asking questions like, “Have we reached the bottom?” then that might be a sign that there may be a shift.

Talk to your friends and co-workers. How are they feeling about your local economy and housing prices? Are they more optimistic now than they were 3 months ago, or even last month?

Consumer confidence will be a big part in the housing market turning around.

Be on the lookout for mortgage interest rates stabilizing and mortgage companies start to ease lending restrictions.

One of the biggest indicators is when prices have stopped dropping. The secret is to buy before they start to inch back up again!

I’m not suggesting that you wait till the absolute bottom of your market to buy. You have to look at a home as a place to live, not an investment. Only you can determine what an affordable monthly payment is relative to the value of the home you are purchasing. There are individual homes for sale that can be bought at the bottom of your market, even if homes in general have not reached that mark.

Talk to a trusted real estate agent – we can help!

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Local Information for Middletown, NY

Latitude: 41.445754 -- Longitude: -74.422066

Other Area Cities: Cornwall on Hudson Middletown Monroe Warwick Port Jervis

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Middletown is a city in Orange County, New York, USA, in New York's Hudson Valley region, near the Walkill River, in the foothills of the Shawangunk Mountains. The City of Middletown lies along the northern boundary of the New York Metropolitan Area, an imaginary line that runs from Poughkeepsie through Newburgh, Middletown, and Port Jervis, New York. The population of Middletown was 25,388 at the 2000 census. The zip code is 10940. Middletown grew up with the Erie Railroad and the New York, Ontario and Western Railway (among others) and attracted a number of employers, such as shoe, lawnmower blade, and furniture factories, but most of these businesses had closed by the 1960s. The closing of a large Ford Motor Company plant in Mahwah, New Jersey, and the downsizing of IBM operations in the area were a blow to the economy of Middletown and surrounding communities in the 1970s. -- Source: Wikipedia.com

New York 2000 Census Population Profile Map

	Middletown	New York	United States
Population	25,388	18,976,457	281,421,906
Median age	33.4	35.9	35.3
Median age for Male	31.8	34.5	34
Median age for Female	34.7	37.2	36.5
Households	9,466	7,056,860	105,480,101
Household population	24,807	18,395,996	273,643,273
Average household size	2.62	2.61	2.59
Families	5,963	4,639,387	71,787,347
Average family size	3.27	3.22	3.14
Housing units	10,124	7,679,307	115,904,641
Occupied units	9,466	7,056,860	105,480,101
Vacant units	658	622,447	10,424,540

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