New Jersey's Midtown Direct Real Estate Markets Start 2008 Stronger.

Since the 2nd of January my phone 973-647-0253 has been ringing constantly with new home buyers wanting information one Midtown Direct town or another.  Even relocating home buyers know that it is more advantageous for future home appreciation to be on the Midtown Direct train line than to be in one of the towns which are not served by the train system.

2008 seems to be starting off much stronger than 2007 ended.  I personally have 5 pending sales as I write this, but here is the rub, I talk with many local REALTORS every day, most of them are seeking feedback from showings I have had with buyers at these real estate agents listings.  They talk about how slow the New Jersey Real Estate market is, and how they just hate to sit another open house at such and such listing.  These are the REALTORS who are doing things in the old ways, they are spending their time, marketing their listings and themselves in the old ways.  As you can tell from my explanation the old ways that most REALTORS are still using are not generating very many New Jersey Home Buyers these days.

The majority of the buyers I have working with over the past 6 months are buyers who are relocating from other areas of the country or world for that matter.  These home buyers are very motivated to buy a home but, in 2008 most of these home buyers know quite well what they want and are willing to wait and temporarily rent for a few months until the right house at the right price comes along, rather than to settle for a overpriced home, especially if that home needs updating or work.  These buyers are what I would call Savvy buyers, they do many hours of research online, making sure they fully understand a town and neighborhood before they have even talked with a NJ REALTOR such as myself.  Once they are talking with a NJ REALTOR such as myself and become interested in a few homes, they usually do a intense amount of research on the comparable sales, and what the price trending is for a given neighborhood, before they make any offers.  One other interesting point is that they usually do not make any sort of offers on homes that are more than 5% over priced as they just do not want to deal with a home owner who in the words of one home buyers "is trying to ripe him off".

If you are thinking of selling your home, my best advice as of January 2008 is:  Act Now, There will be literally hundreds of expired home listings from 2007 coming back onto the market  in March and April of 2008.  Some of these home owners understand that they will not get spring of 2006 prices now and will price their homes much more aggressively, while others will still be reaching for the spring of 2006 prices which sadly for them are unlikely to be obtained in 2008 or even 2009.   Why is this important?  If a buyer has 3 or 4 homes that almost exactly match their criteria they will be able to make a decision and will know that likely someone else will like that home as well, but if there are 20 homes that almost match the criteria many home buyers will take that as a sign that they can have what the want at any time and will not feel the need to make a offer as something better may come down the road tomorrow, and if not the one they most like today likely will still be on the market tomorrow.

James Boyer REALTOR, Specializing in the Chatham NJ Real Estate market.  For 2007 home sales statistics for many of the Midtown Direct Home markets visit conventnews.org

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