There is often some confusion about real estate terms used to describe the different types of markets consumers will experience when buying or selling homes.
Below is an explanation of a buyers' market, sellers' market, and balanced market to help you understand what that really means.
Buyers' Market:
In a buyers' market the buyers have more control than the sellers.
This type of market occurs when there is an abundance of listing inventory available and there are more sellers than buyers.
Buyers often benefit from this with lower prices and seller concessions, such as more price flexibility, and seller-paid buyer closing costs.
A market with more than six month's supply of listing inventory* is considered a buyers' market.
*A six month's supply of inventory means that if no new homes were to be listed, our current supply would last six months.
Sellers' Market
In a sellers' market, the sellers have more control than the buyers.
This type of market occurs when there is a low listing inventory, more buyers than sellers, homes are not on the market for very long, and often there are multiple offers on homes.
A sellers' market benefits sellers with higher prices, fewer days on markets, less seller-paid buyer closing costs, and often multiple-offer bidding wars.
A market with less than four month's listing inventory is considered a sellers' market.
Balanced Market
In a balanced market, neither buyers nor sellers have the advantage.
A market with about four to six month's listing inventory is considered to be a balanced market.
To learn more about the current real estate market and how that affects you as a buyer or seller, call us at (208) 327-2127.
