Have you heard?!

Forbes cited stats from the monthly Denver Metro Association of Realtors (DMAR) Market Trends Report in their recent article “The Most Competitive Housing Markets in the U.S. Going Into 2019”. Bigger news still, Denver was ranked number one on their list of the top 10 most competitive housing markets in the U.S. That’s big!

Yes, California still dominates the list, but it’s interesting (and kind of crazy) to see Denver climb to the top ahead of so many tech hubs. According to the article and our report, the median sales price for Denver ranged from $502,000 to over $540,000 during 2018.

Here is a link to the the trends report that is referenced if you want to see more detail of the Denver Real Estate market. This is one of many reports and data streams we see every day to help our clients be successful in selling and buying properties.

Forbes article references the DMAR web page with the following information:

A new study of 1.5 million home-buyers—and their competitive behavior when it comes to buying a house—comes with some slightly surprising results: California is not at the top of the list. Instead it is Denver, Colorado, where you have to flex your home-buying muscle the most, according to data from a study by Lending Tree. They looked at the 1.5 million mortgage requests for purchase loans that came through their system in 2018 and ranked the cities based on three main criteria:

• Share of buyers shopping for a mortgage before choosing a house
• Average down payment percentage.
• Percentage of buyers who have a credit score above 680.

Granted, Lending Tree is not a lender, but an online broker that matches applicants with various lending institutions, but 1.5 million people is still a significant enough size to learn some interesting takeaways—such as the other surprising result that average down payment sizes are all less than 20%.

Here is the list of the top ten cities, with the average amount of the down-payment in parentheses.

1. Denver (16%)
2. Los Angeles (17%)
3. Portland, Oregon (15%)
4. San Francisco (17%)
5. San Jose, California (19%)
6. St. Louis (15%)
7. Las Vegas (14%)
8. Seattle (19%)
9. Sacramento, California (15%)
10. Boston (16%)

Of course California still dominates the list, which isn’t too surprising since four cities in the state are also at the top of the list of how much you need to earn to live in each U.S. city. Yet, it is interesting to see Denver climb to the top ahead of all the tech hubs. The median sales price for Denver ranged from $502,000 to over $540,000 during 2018, according to the Denver Metro Association of Realtors. Las Vegas is also somewhat of a surprise since home prices there have finally crossed back over the $300,000 threshold after plummeting to nearly half that during the housing crash after 2008.

Best Buying Practices

One of the many things to keep in mind, it is no longer just about how much you bring to the table, but also your buying behavior that will put you ahead of other buyers.  To understand what that means, let’s meet and I can show you how to get the best results in buying and selling. Call me today and let’s get started.  303-898-9000

Thanks for your trust,

Steve Jacobson
Professional real estate broker with experience of over 4000 successful sales to assist you.