“Chicken Little, The Sky Is Not Falling!”

By Mort Floch, Broker/Owner

How often have we heard that the sky is falling, or similar, from the glass-is-half-empty folks? Some people can always find the bad side of a situation, just as others can always find the good, if they look for it. For our purposes here, we are talking about Real Estate. In our magazines, our newspapers, on TV and radio, we are bombarded with news of the terrible Real Estate market, here, there, or anywhere.

Well, the truth is that there is good and bad to every situation. Real Estate – like the weather – is local, not national. While what happens in one part of our great country often affects what happens in another part, usually local markets have lives of their own. With regard to Real Estate in the Central Mississippi area, the news is mostly good. During the 12 month period, ending 12/31/2007, there were actually more home sales recorded by our office than there were during the same period in 2006.  That’s right, MORE closings!

Make sure when you are reading what the press has to say, especially in your local paper, that you check the top of the article to see if it was locally written or, as is most often the case, was picked up from one of the news services that is actually giving you information on markets other than ours. 

Most of the hard working Realtors I know, working for commission, earned larger incomes in 2007 than they did in 2006. Houses sold for about 4% less, and were on the market a little longer, but sell they did, and by the Realtors who were willing to get out and work. According to our research, there were more than 300 real estate transactions in just the last 5 days of 2007!

With the hard work and support of our City government and the additional support of our Chamber of Commerce the commercial growth in the Flowood area is almost unprecedented in the State. This growth is bringing businesses, visitors and new residents, all of whom are adding to our economy and making the area financially sound and a very desirable place to live.

We are experiencing building booms and great residential growth in the Flowood/Brandon/Rankin County area. People are moving into this area in very large numbers and they need places to live. Young people continue to marry and they need places to live. Couples are starting families and they need larger places to live. Existing families are growing and they need larger places to live. Most often it is less expensive for them to own than it is to rent.

Fortunately, for all of these folks, mortgage interest rates are close to an all time low! Obviously, this allows more buyers to purchase homes, and most buyers to purchase homes more expensive than they normally could. There are many buyers out there right now and anyone who has been thinking about selling a home should think about doing right now as well. We often refer to the “pool” of people who can buy your home. By that we mean the people who can afford it – who can afford the payments on their mortgages and the extras that normally come up with home ownership. Well, when mortgage rates hover around 6% and below, as they are now, obviously you can buy a lot more for your money than you can when mortgage rates are closer to 10% as they were not very long ago.

Additionally, real estate has always been a very good investment when, like all investments, it is made intelligently and with the help of a professional. That’s what we Realtors do. We are there to help you make sound investments that, over a reasonable period of time, would bring you many rewards, not only financially, but also in safe, sound, secure places to live, to work and to raise families if those are your goals.

This is a great time to buy a home, to sell a home, to invest in homes, to work in the Real Estate industry. For more information, call me.