Albuquerque Real Estate Talk 485 – SAVE on Your Property Tax Bill

Albuquerque Real Estate Talk 485 – SAVE on Your Property Tax Bill

SAVE ON YOUR PROPERTY TAX BILL - Albuquerque Real Estate Talk

Springtime traditionally brings a surge in new listings in the Albuquerque real estate market, and 2024 is no exception. Tego and Tracy discuss the noticeable uptick in properties hitting the market, particularly highlighting the variety and quality of homes available. From open houses in Corrales listed under $500,000 to luxury homes near Rio Grande and Griegos, the market is vibrant with options for potential buyers.

Delving into the nitty-gritty, the Venturi's share comprehensive Albuquerque Housing Market data for March 2024. Despite a somewhat shocking dip in the number of sales – down to 740 homes sold in March – demand remains high. Affordability appears to be the main obstacle holding back buyers, a trend Tego and Tracy have been closely monitoring.

Interesting stats reveal that while 286 homes came onto the market last week, 243 went pending, indicating a relatively balanced flow. Moreover, median days on the market for homes was a mere eight days, pointing towards a still competitive market space where desirable homes don't linger long.

Here is a summary of the March 2024 data and the percent change from March 2023.
- Closed Sales: 738, which is a decrease of 14.4% ❌
- Inventory (Active Listings): 1,223, which is an increase of 14.8% 📈
- New Listings: 1,049, which is a rise of 3.2% 🆕
- Pending Sales: 927, which is an increase of 10.5% ⏳
- Month Supply: 1.5, which is a rise of 25.0% 📈
- Median DOM (Resale only): 8, which is a rise of 14.3% ⏰
- Median Sale Price: $340,000, which is a rise of 4.6% 💰
- Average Sale Price: $383,868, which is a rise of 3.6% 💰
- Median Price per SqFt: $201, which is a rise of 4.1% 📈
* Data from Southwest MLS and includes all Single Family homes (attached and detached) in the Albuquerque MSA

Home Prices and Affordability

When it comes to home prices, Albuquerque sees a continuous rise, albeit at a more moderate pace compared to the last few years. Median prices for closed sales of detached, single-family homes reached $351,000, up by approximately 8% from the previous year. Interestingly, new construction median prices have seen a decrease, a phenomenon attributed to what Tego and Tracy term "shrinkflation" – builders are making homes more affordable by scaling down size without compromising on quality.

The Apartment Market Update

An essential update on Albuquerque's apartment market reveals shifting dynamics. Tego offers insights into the current apartment market landscape, highlighting a potential surplus due to an increase in units under construction. With a vacancy rate at 9.5%, this could hint at a stabilization or even a flattening of rental rates, making it an area to watch for both investors and renters.

As tax assessment notices find their way into mailboxes, Tego and Tracy venture into the often confusing realm of property taxes and assessments. They clarify the process, emphasizing the importance of understanding the notice of value sent by tax assessors and exploring options for protests if the assessed value seems off the mark. They also shed light on various tax savings programs, including veterans' benefits and value freezes for qualifying residents, proving invaluable for property owners aiming to navigate their tax obligations smartly.

Final Thoughts

Wrapping up their comprehensive talk, the Venturis touch on what buyers and sellers want most from real estate agents, based on insights from Realtor.com. Beyond finding the right home, competencies around negotiation, paperwork, financing, and deep local knowledge stand out as top priorities. This reinforces Tego and Tracy's commitment to providing exceptional service, backed by data-driven insights and a thorough understanding of the Albuquerque real estate market.

As we progress through 2024, the Albuquerque real estate landscape continues to evolve. Tego and Tracy Venturi remain at the forefront, offering their expertise and guidance to navigate these exciting times. Whether you're buying, selling, or simply in love with all things real estate, staying informed is key, and Albuquerque Real Estate Talk is your trusted source.

Albuquerque Real Estate Talk 485 April 06, 2024

Tego Venturi: [00:00:00] Welcome to Albuquerque real estate talk. It is first week of April, 2024 episode four 85 is Tego and Tracy Venturi. And this week, Tracy, we've got. The March data, what happened with home sales and Albuquerque prices and sales and pendings and all that fun stuff that I love to go through. What's happening with prices.

Tego Venturi: I know that's what everybody really wants to know. It's tax assessment time. We've got piles of tax assessment notices on our desk here. We're going to talk about that. People get those in the mail and a lot of times they're like, what do I do with this? So you're going to go through that for us. I've got an update on what's happening with the apartment market in Albuquerque.

Tego Venturi: We'll get into that as well as I'm sure we'll go off in some other places. And we have some homes and properties of the week. We want to talk about. We sure do. 

Tracy Venturi: Yep. Some great open houses this weekend, a few homes that came on the market just in time for the weekend. So you can check those out on our website.

Tracy Venturi: Welcome home abq. com under the open house tab. And find [00:01:00] everything there or, you know, call us. We can tell you, we have one in Corrales. New on the market under 500, 000. One in the near Northeast Heights that just came on the market and a few other open houses. I know there's one on 1856 Cay Barbarita as well.

Tracy Venturi: So if you want to know that one's in the Valley near Rio Grande and Griegos, really beautiful home, very high end finishes. 

Tego Venturi: Well, since you went, went there, let's just talk about that. We did see another little, I want to call it a surge, but I don't know, maybe a tiny surge. A little bump in new properties coming on the market this, this week.

Tego Venturi: It's pretty common this time of year where we see a surge in people getting their homes on the market. So we have seen a little bit of an increase in the number of homes on the market. 

Tracy Venturi: Yeah, we have. It is that time of year this week, we had some nice days and some not so nice days and this weekend, again, a mixed bag of weather, but it seems like once we hit some really [00:02:00] beautiful weather everyone's out looking for houses and people think, okay, it's time to put my house on the market.

Tracy Venturi: So yeah, we're, we're hitting that time here in April. 

Tego Venturi: Spring and you know how we can tell it's spring in New Mexico. 

Tracy Venturi: Everyone's sneezing. No, 

Tego Venturi: it's sunny and Chris and, and, you know, warm sun during the day, crisp nights and the wind is blowing. 

Tracy Venturi: Yeah. 

Tego Venturi: Sorry. 

Tracy Venturi: And people have allergies, but I guess that's not just spring.

Tracy Venturi: That's the wind. Yeah. Yeah. 

Tego Venturi: All right, let's talk about some of the, the, just, just the market data that came in for March of 24 in Albuquerque. I'm looking at everything in the entire metropolitan statistical area, which is the, the four, four counties that we're in here in central New Mexico. And I want to start off with the number of sales, because that's really the number that has been shockingly low.

Tego Venturi: The number of homes that It's sold in the Albuquerque MLS. So I got to change it. I just got to change the stat here. I don't have it lined up quite right. [00:03:00] Okay. It's down. I mean, it's definitely down to put it in context. You know, this, this last month in March, there were 740 homes that sold in March in March.

Tego Venturi: If we go back to March of two years ago, it was almost double that. So I'm not two years ago, but three years ago. So the, the number of sales have definitely seen when you said 

Tracy Venturi: 700 something for March. I thought, Oh my gosh, that is significantly down. And yes. 

Tego Venturi: Yeah. And so it is something we're keeping an eye on, but yet at the same time.

Tego Venturi: There's people out there that want to buy. There's people that are out there that are waiting for the right home to come on the market. So it's not for a lack of demand. The demand is there. The thing that's holding people back is affordability, of course. 

Tracy Venturi: Well, in the last week, Tega, 286 houses came on the market.

Tracy Venturi: And [00:04:00] 243 went pending sale under contract, not necessarily of the 286, but of all the ones available for sale. So the rate of sale of those coming on the market and them going pending is, you know, fairly equal. 

Tego Venturi: Let me show you that. Let me tell you that stat. I know you 

Tracy Venturi: probably have a monthly stat for that.

Tego Venturi: So, yeah, no, actually it's, it's, it's very telling. So Previously owned homes, not new construction that the days on market because days on market for new construction is kind of wonky because Sometimes they're not finished when they get put in the MLS. And so they just, anyway, but median days on market for the homes that closed in March, so probably went pending in, you know, February, you know, somewhere in there, right?

Tracy Venturi: Late January, January, February, 

Tego Venturi: median days on market was eight days. So half the homes. When under contract within eight days of going on the market, that was, you know, again, this is back January, February, like you just said, so there's still [00:05:00] people out there looking for homes. 

Tracy Venturi: Absolutely. Absolutely. You know, just to switch back to my one week data, 

Tego Venturi: 194 

Tracy Venturi: properties had price changes in a week.

Tego Venturi: Yeah. That's not unusual. Yeah. You know, again, you hear stats like that, like, oh my gosh. And, you know, so in a vacuum that sounds like, Oh, maybe that's a lot. Maybe that's not out of 1500 homes on the market. That's a good number, right? I think 

Tracy Venturi: the reason I like to look at it is because there's been so much news about how high the prices are and the prices are still going up.

Tracy Venturi: When we work with people who are ready to sell their home, a lot of times they want to price it. Very top of the market, which might be actually above the market, and then they end up, you know, getting price reductions and perhaps, 

Tego Venturi: yeah, having to adjust 

Tracy Venturi: having to adjust 

Tego Venturi: for sure. And, and I track that on a weekly basis.

Tego Venturi: And if I see a surge in the number of price reductions, That's a red flag, right? That tells [00:06:00] us that, okay, there's something going on where homes aren't selling and sellers are getting a little more motivated and, you know, right now it's, it's about 30 percent of all the homes that are on the market have had a price reduction and that's, that's in line with normal.

Tracy Venturi: So just on done me one thing that I need to point out. So that was price changes didn't necessarily say price reductions. And I did notice that a couple of new home builders raised prices on everything that appeared to be under construction or almost ready. And they had some price increases actually.

Tracy Venturi: And some new builders had price decreases to move some things that, you know, so not everything was a price reduction. 

Tego Venturi: Yeah. So talking to prices, just, just a quick rundown here. What happened with home prices for March, closed sales, single family, detached homes came in at 351, 000 median price. Came [00:07:00] in at 256, 000.

Tego Venturi: These are resale homes. So, you know, previously owned homes. That's 8 percent for detached and about 8 percent what I'm sorry, 8 percent increase from March last year, median price, and about a 5 percent increase. Attach from March last year. The thing that's really interesting though, and I want to break this down because it tells an interesting story is if you break out new construction versus.

Tego Venturi: Resale new construction. Median price is actually down about 12 percent from last year again. And I like I go back to resale was up about maybe, you know, 78 percent in that range. However, when you look at price per square foot, I know I'm getting really complicated here. Price per square foot on new construction is actually up 6 percent yet at the same time, median price is down 12%.

Tego Venturi: So how can that be? Well, [00:08:00] I think the term is shrinkflation. It's the homes have been value engineered and the builders and you have to give builders credit, right? They're trying to build a product that people can afford. They're making the home smaller. They're making them more affordable. You've got to look on your face.

Tracy Venturi: You just like led right into the next thing I was going to talk about. Okay. Well, perfect. Okay. So fellowship homes, local builder, great family fellowship homes. They have two houses on the market today. that we could help you with that's in their Las Casitas series in Rio Rancho on larger lots, about a third of an acre off Northern Boulevard listed at basically 280, 279.

Tracy Venturi: 9. There are two bedroom, two bath, two car garages, new construction. 

Tego Venturi: Got it. 

Tracy Venturi: 279. 9. So wait, wait, 

Tego Venturi: wait. Where's that? 

Tracy Venturi: Northern Boulevard in Rio Rancho. 

Tego Venturi: Got it. I didn't know where that was. It's 

Tracy Venturi: West of answer. 

Tego Venturi: That's a, that's a rare entity in [00:09:00] today's market. New construction under 300, 000. 

Tracy Venturi: Absolutely. But it's two bedroom, two bath, two car garage.

Tracy Venturi: So that's great. At least it's a two car garage because here in New Mexico, we need that two car garage. We don't have basements, right? Yes, we do. We need it. So it's out Northern past, you know, Unser on half, on third acre lots. So build beautiful homes. So, you know but that's right to your point that a lot of the builders are building smaller to help with affordability.

Tracy Venturi: Now they're building luxury homes to very beautiful custom luxury homes. So this is not, you know, what they do every day, but you get their beautiful building style and quality. At a more affordable price 

Tego Venturi: if you want to dig more into the market data. I did do a video about 9 10 minutes It's on our youtube channel.

Tego Venturi: Just look for the venturi group On youtube and you can I I take you through all the market stats for march And of course i've got a bunch of stuff [00:10:00] on our website about the market data at Welcome home abq. com. And let me just, just put, put one, just ending on this whole market thing. The, the, the, the day, the takeaway is home prices are continuing to go up much more moderate pace than we've seen in, you know, the last couple of three years, which was kind of nutty but sales are down.

Tego Venturi: The number of people, you know, purchasing and moving is, is down. And we know that the number of people listing their homes is down. People aren't moving as often because they're locked in at these really great, you know, mortgage rates. So there is kind of a market lockup to a certain extent where there's buyers that want to buy, there's sellers that want to sell, but both of them are kind of locked for different reasons.

Tego Venturi: But yet at the same time, home prices have continued to increase. 

Tracy Venturi: Yep. All right. So we are Tico and Tracy Venturi with Real Broker here in Albuquerque. We appreciate you guys listening to us and watching us and [00:11:00] getting on our Instagram and our YouTube and, and all of those things and following us and, and Tico, we hit a big milestone this week, so we appreciate all of you on YouTube, on YouTube.

Tracy Venturi: We just. Went over a thousand subscribers, subscribers. There we go. So thank you. But if you do watch on YouTube, we'd love for you to follow us. And it it means a lot to Tego because you know, he spends a lot of time on all this data to keep everybody up to date and loves to do it. 

Tego Venturi: Well, like I said, on my, my market update is, I mean, obviously We're trying to promote ourselves as, you know, a competent real estate team here, here in Albuquerque, no doubt about that.

Tego Venturi: But there's been so much bad information about what's going on in the real estate market that I really just want to get the, get the good data out there and the good information so people can really understand where, where things are at. 

Tracy Venturi: Totally. Yeah. 

Tego Venturi: Tracy. I appreciate 

Tracy Venturi: that. 

Tego Venturi: It's April. 

Tracy Venturi: Yes, I know.

Tracy Venturi: You know what 

Tego Venturi: that, we just said, it's April and it's tax season, [00:12:00] yay. 

Tracy Venturi: I know what you're going for. I know. Because we. Received our notice of value on houses. Hold 

Tego Venturi: on. It's not just income tax season. I had, I had a whole script right here. Okay. Yeah. Let me, let me do my script. My script was, it's not just income tax season.

Tego Venturi: It's property tax season. Okay. Well, it's property assessment season. All right. So let's, let's, let's get into that. If you're, if you're a property owner, You're going to be getting your, you should be getting a letter in the mail. If you're on the video, you can see it looks like this is one from Bernalillo County.

Tego Venturi: I've got one from Sandoval County here. You get a letter in the mail and it says time sensitive dated material open right away. And a lot of people get them that like they're first time buyers and they'll call us in the first year they get this and go, what am I supposed to do with this? What is this about?

Tracy Venturi: And there's a lot of people who get them who don't open the envelope. Well, there's that too, 

Tego Venturi: right? So, so Tracy. What is this all about? 

Tracy Venturi: So this is the time of year where [00:13:00] the tax assessor send out a notice of value and tells you here's what we believe your home is worth. And this is what it will be based on for taxes.

Tracy Venturi: When we put together taxes later this year, this is not a bill, it's a notice of value and it's the time of year. where you get to look at it and go, okay, does this make sense? Because it's the time you can protest what they say your value is. Now, Tego, we all know the news has told us over the years that if you have a residence, it's residential, that they will only in New Mexico raise it by 3 percent max per year.

Tego Venturi: Correct. That is state statute. State statute. 3% of the full assessed value, not the taxable value, if you are in the home, but there's exceptions to that. 

Tracy Venturi: Yes, there are exceptions to that. And when you get your notice of value, especially the Bernalillo County one, it's very clear what the exceptions are right on this sheet of paper here.

Tego Venturi: I will say, so we, we own property in [00:14:00] Bernalillo County. We own property in Sandoval County and Valencia and Valencia County. And I will say that the Bernalillo County Assessor has a nice, very clear information sheet about what you need to know about your assessed value. 

Tracy Venturi: They do. 

Tego Venturi: So, 

Tracy Venturi: so the exceptions are upon sale, the title companies or the owner, if you don't go through a title company are required to notify the owner.

Tracy Venturi: The county of the sale price, correct? And based on that sale price, they can raise the taxable value more than 3%. They can bring it up to assess value, right? To real value of the property based on the sale price. So that's when years ago we had that whole talk about tax lightning where people bought a house and they were surprised because the taxes went up so high.

Tracy Venturi: So now as realtors we disclose what the taxes could be based on the sale price. 

Tego Venturi: Yeah, because what will happen if somebody is in a home, let's say they're in a home for 20 [00:15:00] years And it's only been increasing the assessed value has only been increasing three percent per year When they do sell that property, you know, and it the assessed value may be 150 000 and the real value is 400 000 So that new buyer is going to see the current tax bill based at 160 And then they're going to see And then, you know, the, the following year they get a tax bill based on 400 and it's going to be a shock.

Tego Venturi: So yeah, you know, people need to understand that when, when they do purchase a property, it can get reassessed at full value. There's no, there's no cap. Another exception Tracy is if you do a, like a major remodel and upgrade the house 

Tracy Venturi: or add on to it. 

Tego Venturi: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That could trigger a reassessment if you change zoning, that could trigger a reassessment.

Tego Venturi: And again, the 3 percent cap, it's just for 

Tracy Venturi: residential. 

Tego Venturi: And there's a whole, I don't know if I want to go down there. Let me just say it. There's a debate out there about right, right now, if like Airbnb short term rental [00:16:00] type properties. Should get that if they're 

Tracy Venturi: residential. 

Tego Venturi: Yeah, if they're residential nuts, that's just the debate that's out there I'm not gonna go anywhere with it.

Tego Venturi: I just it's an interesting debate that's happening. 

Tracy Venturi: So the other thing about that is sometimes properties are sold and they don't go through the title company to You know, automatically send the assessor's office the, the sale price. So you will get a letter in the mail typically saying, Hey, you need to tell us within 30 days what you paid for that parcel.

Tracy Venturi: So sometimes that's how it happens too. 

Tego Venturi: Well, in that state statute by statute, you are supposed to do that, 

Tracy Venturi: right? It's interesting because I read the fine print and it said a failure to do so can be a misdemeanor. So, yeah, you probably want to do that. 

Tego Venturi: So a couple of things I did want to talk about and, you know, I actually, I actually interviewed Assessor Damien Lara for Bernalillo County here for a few months ago, six months ago or so, and they do have some [00:17:00] tax savings programs that I think people need to go know about.

Tego Venturi: And one of them is head of household. 

Tracy Venturi: Right. So, 

Tego Venturi: One person, primary resident. You can take 2, 000 off your 

Tracy Venturi: taxable value, 

Tego Venturi: which is only a third of your 

Tracy Venturi: full value. 

Tego Venturi: But you 

Tracy Venturi: have to do that proactively. Correct. You have to get with the county to apply for head of household for that deduction. 

Tego Venturi: The other tax programs are if you are low income, there's an income limit.

Tracy Venturi: 65 

Tego Venturi: or older. 65 or older or disabled. Disabled. You qualify for a value freeze again. You got to talk to him and make sure you qualify. I'm not giving any advice here, but I just want you to know it's there, meaning that they they'll they'll freeze the value wherever it currently is, and they won't even do the 3 percent per year.

Tracy Venturi: So I worked with a home seller this past week. The house is already under contract and it was that way. It had a the value [00:18:00] was frozen and the seller said very clearly, Hey, I want to make sure that whoever buys my house knows that my taxes are unusually low because I'm over 65 and I got the County to freeze it.

Tracy Venturi: And I was like, well, good for you. I didn't, you know, most people don't know about that. Right. So he was lower income. Me. He did really well his whole life, but he doesn't have a lot of income now. He's fine, but he was able to freeze the value of his property. So when it is sold, it will jump up because the new value is, is different.

Tego Venturi: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And 

Tracy Venturi: then there's another one. Well, there's 

Tego Venturi: two more that, that apply to veterans. Well, one of them is any veteran there. There is again, you gotta, you gotta apply for it, but you have a 4, 000 reduction in your. Taxable value. But if somebody is a hundred percent disabled veteran, they don't pay taxes.

Tego Venturi: Again, you got to qualify for it. You got to go through the process. They have 

Tracy Venturi: to get something from the VA. 

Tego Venturi: The VA is really helpful about that though. They will [00:19:00] help, help people do that and get, get all their information together. So, 

Tracy Venturi: so there's that. So more, more about 

Tego Venturi: property tax. Yeah. Anyway, go ahead.

Tego Venturi: Choice. Well, I was going to say, you 

Tracy Venturi: know, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, The, the time that you can protest the value, if you opened your notice of value and that's 

Tego Venturi: the most important thing I just interrupted you, 

Tracy Venturi: you know, you noticed your notice of value you feel like it's high, we can help you with that.

Tracy Venturi: If we can find homes that have sold in your area that are similar for a lower value. We can help you if you want to protest and have to have some sort of justification for it. Or if you bought your house last year and it was 200, 000 and they're saying it's worth 300, 000, you know, get with your realtor and get a copy of your closing statement if you don't have it and protest it and submit a copy of your closing statement along with it.

Tego Venturi: Well, there's a lot of people that'll look at it and go. Well, this seems high, but they don't know, right? We can help you with that. Just reach out to us. That includes vacant land as [00:20:00] well. We can help you you know, get, get a, basically a baseline and see if it makes sense for you to do the, do the protest or the appeal, I guess they call it.

Tracy Venturi: The thing that's important to remember about that is you only have 30 days from the day it was mailed to make your appeal of the value. And there are companies that will do that for you. If you feel like you better. I, I know somebody who bought commercial real estate, like millions of dollars was the purchase price and they protested through a company that did it for them, that really knew what they were doing, saved them a lot of money in taxes because they were successful in reducing the value of that property.

Tego Venturi: I would say for just individual homeowners. Do it yourself. Yeah. Because when you as a taxpayer, homeowner, resident, you have more leverage than some entity, you know, but again, in the commercial world, that's very common. We're talking more just about residential, but yes, hiring [00:21:00] somebody in the commercial You can though.

Tego Venturi: Yeah. Oh, absolutely. There are people who 

Tracy Venturi: will do it for you for land or residential if you wish. Yeah. I mean if it's They just take a portion of the savings they get. So if they don't get you savings, they don't get paid. That's the way I understand the ones that I know of. 

Tego Venturi: That's my understanding as well.

Tego Venturi: And there's a few companies in town that do that for sure. Tego, 

Tracy Venturi: do we have time for me to talk about what buyers and sellers want most from real estate agents? Realtor. com did a little magazine story and they interviewed a bunch of people about what buyers and sellers want. And I thought ahead of time before I read it, I went, okay, what do buyers and sellers want, right?

Tracy Venturi: They want competence. They want knowledge. They want information. They want someone that knows what they're doing to hold their hand, because there are a lot of different things with the real estate transaction that can come up and a lot of dates and deadlines and a lot of who do I go to for this, right?

Tego Venturi: Can I tell you something? I looked at that list. And I thought it was interesting because to me it said, they don't know what they don't know. [00:22:00] 

Tracy Venturi: Right. 

Tego Venturi: Because there's stuff on there that just not on there that should be. Anyway, go ahead. 

Tracy Venturi: Yeah. Right. They don't know what they don't know. And that's what we learn a lot, especially with home buyers.

Tracy Venturi: So if you know someone that should be buying a house, a lot of times they don't even want to pick up the phone and call us because They don't even know what to say. They're like I'm thinking of buying a house and they don't know. I was shocked at someone that I know really well who said that to me, like, well, I don't really know, like the first steps.

Tracy Venturi: And I'm thinking you're kind of in the industry. And you know, that just told me again, That the general public really needs help. So what do they really, really want? It's interesting, right? They want help finding the right home. We all have all of our apps. We can all find homes online, right? But they need help negotiating terms of a sale, price negotiations, help with all the paperwork determining what the home value is, like what should I be paying [00:23:00] for it?

Tracy Venturi: Determining how much you can afford. Right. We help get with a lender if you don't have cash, right? And most people are using loans. We help them get with a great local lender to help determine what they can afford. And not just what you can afford, but what you're comfortable with your monthly payment, right?

Tracy Venturi: Not just, Hey, you can spend this much because you might not be that comfortable with that much of your monthly, right? Help arrange financing. Help teach buyer more about the neighborhood and areas. They say restaurants, parks, public transportations. I love to, when we're showing homes, I love to talk about livability and what makes people want to be in a certain neighborhood and what are the benefits and attributes of this location, right?

Tracy Venturi: Because. Right here by our office. We've got amazing parks. You know, the open spaces right here. We've got trails all, all throughout the Valley and along the river that make it really special. Right. But somebody coming from a different part of town might not know that two blocks away, there's a parking lot [00:24:00] and a paved path for 35 miles.

Tracy Venturi: Right. But also teaching. people about the whole process and being a homeowner. That's pretty hard, right? Like a lot of people don't even know, like setting up utilities and things like that. They haven't had an apartment even where they had to do that. So it's, it's that whole process. A lot of things that we learn.

Tego Venturi: So let me give the things that not on that survey that people don't know that they don't know. So what questions to ask, 

Tracy Venturi: right? 

Tego Venturi: Like if you're, if you're a first time home buyer, you don't even know what questions to ask. 

Tracy Venturi: Right. 

Tego Venturi: You know, another example is in our, in our, in our residential sales, there's probably a dozen different variables.

Tego Venturi: Again, if you don't even know what to ask, is it in a pi? Is it in a HOA? What do I need to know about the HOA? What do I need to know about the pi? Is there cc and r? Right? And you know, what inspections should I be getting? [00:25:00] You know, again, it's all these questions you don't even know what to ask, right? When you get the inspection, what, what should I be worried about?

Tego Venturi: Right? There's, there's so many things to, to me, that's the value, you know, in our, in our purchase agreement, I've, I've tracked it before. There's 48 potential dates to keep track of from when you go under contract. Now that's, that's the maximum, but on average, there's probably about 20 different dates That you have to keep track of from going under contract or closing because there's contingencies like people don't even know what contingencies are.

Tego Venturi: So what does a contingency mean? Right. Is there the financing contingency? Is there inspection contingency? Is there HOA contingencies that, da da da da da. Right? So it to, to me, that's the big value when we talk about, you know, what realtors do, it's not finding homes. 

Tracy Venturi: Right. You know what, in listening to that list, Tego, I think about some of the things that we [00:26:00] know from showing homes for.

Tracy Venturi: 20 years, right? We know about polybutylene piping. We know about Orangeburg. We know about Kitech. 

Tego Venturi: We have that list. It's the red flags list. That 

Tracy Venturi: we created. That we 

Tego Venturi: created of different areas of town, different neighborhoods that we just know that there there might be some things to consider. 

Tracy Venturi: Yeah, it's, it's right down to if there are in floor ducks, that's something you want to get checked.

Tracy Venturi: Right. And, and even sewer lines, you know, we talked about this the other day in a training and people, some, some people think, well, the house is pretty new. I don't need to get a sewer line inspection and we're like, oh, well we've had new construction have sewer line problems. And just because there's no trees in the front yard near the sewer line or in the backyard, if it happens to be the sewer line that way.

Tracy Venturi: does not mean that there aren't obstructions in that sewer line. So, those are the things that you know, we can really help with. Yeah, 

Tego Venturi: just in all the conversation going on in the realtor community about, you know, [00:27:00] what the value of, of what we do is, I think it's important to point out it's more than just finding the home, right?

Tego Venturi: That, that's, that's not really it. It's everything else. I did just want to hit on one thing before we run out of time here. I was on a seminar, webinar. With costar, which is apartments. com. They, they do a bunch of anyway, they have the best data when it comes to apartments in, in rent, the rental market.

Tego Venturi: And I thought it was interesting. There was a couple of big things that jumped out at me. And that's is that we might be going into a little bit of surplus in apartments in the Albuquerque market. The reason is we have a lot of properties under construction as you guys, if we all drive around, we can see.

Tego Venturi: There were 1800 units that came in like doors, apartments, basically units that came in last year when the normal number is maybe three to 400. Now there was. Some catch up as well because during the pandemic, [00:28:00] everything stopped there for a couple years also. Right. But, but what they're saying is that we do now have a nine and a half percent vacancy rate, vacancy rate in, in apartments.

Tego Venturi: And it's interesting because it's, it's It's kind of across all price ranges. The thing that's interesting though, is the ones that are being built right now are what they call the four and five star, right? So these are the higher end luxury type units, more expensive. The, the thing that took away that I took away from that is that the luxury is, you know, more like 14 percent vacancy, the, the one, two, and three star, which are, you know, more basic properties it's under that maybe nine, 8%, something like that.

Tego Venturi: But there are 2300 units under construction in the Albuquerque area right now, and there's a bunch more that are proposed but haven't broken ground yet. I think a lot of that is because These developers are looking at the market and saying, I don't know if I'm going to spend that 10, 000, 000 on an apartment building or whatever [00:29:00] it is right now.

Tego Venturi: And then. And the thing that's interesting, wait, wait, let me just, oh, go ahead. With 

Tracy Venturi: that many and you saying 9 percent vacancy rate, I assume that that means that the rental rates are flattening out or not going up. 

Tego Venturi: Yeah. They project that, that rents are going to flatten, rent growth is going to flatten.

Tego Venturi: I mean, they've been very strong the last few years, but they projecting again, this is costarapartments. com. They're projecting one or two to 3%. year over year price appreciation and rentals, which is for the consumers, for the end users, that's good. Cause that's lower than the rate of, of well, not home price in a row.

Tego Venturi: It's lower than the the, the rate of wage gains, right? So, cause right now the wages to cost of housing is way out of whack. And we know that. And then just the, the last thing that was kind of interesting of all the units. That are under construction, this 2300 most of 'em, 60% [00:30:00] of 'em, well not most, but a good portion are the four and five star units.

Tego Venturi: These are the luxury, higher end, you know, type properties. There's about 40% that are three star, which are still, you know, nice. They're kind of middle range. There's zero. I don't know. being built right now. It makes 

Tracy Venturi: sense because the land cost wherever they're building right now, they can't afford to do a 

Tego Venturi: well, and what it is.

Tego Venturi: There's no way that a developer can do affordable. Really without government subsidy is actually what it comes down to. Honestly, I mean, that's, that's just the reality of it. And that, that's where we are. So gosh, we covered a lot today, Tracy. Never a dull moment. Never a dull moment. We're the Venturi Group with Real Broker here in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Tego Venturi: This was episode 485. Been doing this for 10 years, Tracy. 

Tracy Venturi: Yeah. You should enjoy 

Tego Venturi: it. 

Tracy Venturi: Yeah. 

Tego Venturi: And if you want to reach out to us, we're at 505 448 8888 or our website is welcomehome. com. [00:31:00] abq. com and all kinds of goodies there. Find us on 

Tracy Venturi: YouTube and Facebook and Instagram. 

Tego Venturi: Yeah, all the normal places. All the normal 

Tracy Venturi: places, but call us ready to help you with home buying or selling or somebody that you know.

Tego Venturi: Thanks for tuning in again. Take care.

Albuquerque Real Estate Talk 483 – Shocking Effect of Rate Lock-in on Your Home Sales!

Albuquerque Real Estate Talk 483 – Shocking Effect of Rate Lock-in on Your Home Sales!

Albuquerque Real Estate Talk 483 Match 23, 2024

Tego: [00:00:00] Welcome to Albuquerque real estate talk episode 483 end of March 2024 almost the end of March Lobo, basketball weekend pretty excited about that And this week. Well, wow, we got a lot to cover. We've got Of course, the National Association of Realtors Settlement, we have to talk about that. That's the big news in our industry, of course.

But there's a little bit about mortgage rates. We're going to talk about what are the hot zip codes in Albuquerque now for housing, what are more buyer's markets versus seller's markets. We're going to talk. Okay, I got to do it

Tracy: now. I got to talk about septic system. We got to,

Tego: we're going to do the poop on septic systems.

Tracy: Come

Tego: on. I'm a dad. I got to get, I get to do a dad joke. Don't I? Okay, fine. Okay. Yeah. And there was a story about the lock in effect, which we'll, we'll get into that a second and what that means. So Tracy, here we are.

Tracy: So Tico, we're going to start with,

Tego: well, let's first off introduce ourself and how do people get ahold of [00:01:00] us?

Tracy: Sure. So Venturi Realty Group of Real Broker. Best way to reach us, 448 8888 is the phone number. Of course, we're in the 505 448 8888. Welcome home, ABQ. Dot com is our website on

Tego: YouTube. If you want to watch this again or listen to this again, and we also have a lot of market stats we put up there, our Facebook page as well.

So,

Tracy: so on our website, welcome home ABQ, we have all sorts of resources. So feel free to utilize that or just give us a call. We'd be happy to like give you the. The CliffsNotes, the chat GPT version, the, you know, we'd be happy to talk to you in real, real life about stuff if you have real estate questions.

So thanks for listening. We appreciate you every week being here and we, we love when we get questions from you and one of them was about septic systems. So love to talk about that. I'm not going to [00:02:00] use that word you use though. So, so look, can we start there?

Tego: Yeah, of course. Thanks.

Tracy: So we are New Mexico. We have a lot of homes not connected to city services for sewer, right?

A lot of septic systems around, a lot of different kinds of septic systems. You know, we've got people who are close to the water table that might have a special type of septic system. People where there's a lot of granite and rock or big slope where it takes an engineered system that's different, but basically they're all the same, right?

Septic system, things flow out of the house into a tank where the solids fall to the bottom, the liquids drain out of the tank into what we call a drain field. So it goes out through the drain field and filters through dirt until it gets to. The water table. Yep. Right? Yeah. So basically the soil acts as the filter, right?

For the liquids that leave from the tank. [00:03:00] So tanks need to be pumped every once in a while, and there's a whole chart on the office of the state engineers site about how often you should pump your septic tank. Some people tell us, oh, it has to be pumped every year. The chart says, based on how many people live in the house.

How big your tank is, how often you should get it pumped, but every couple of years is a general rule, unless you have a lot of people in your property or you're using it for an event or something. Every couple of years should be fine, but there's probably could be problems with septic tanks and we see it a lot.

You know, upon sale of a property that has a septic tank, the state law requires us to To have it inspected requires that it has to be inspected upon sale and pass, right? Several years ago, the actual regs for those inspectors changed a little bit and we are seeing, I don't know, we don't have a percentage to throw out, but we're seeing TGO, a lot of properties with septic tanks fail on that inspection.

And of course, as [00:04:00] residents of New Mexico, we don't really want the septic tanks to be leaching in the wrong way, right? We want them to be in good shape and not contaminating the ground because it's you know, contaminating or leaking or whatever, but most common is around the lid. We see roots going in because they know there's liquid in there.

It's not sealed properly, or it literally. Cracks, breaks, depending, you know, some are made of concrete to go. Some are plastic. I've, I've seen stainless steel tanks but in general

Tego: stainless steel, I can't be cheap.

Tracy: Yeah. So I was at a actually it was a well inspection. So maybe that's it. It was a well water tank and it was stainless steel.

It wasn't one of the things that

Tego: I've seen very common. There's an era of septic tanks that were made out of concrete. And what happens is the, let's just call it what it is, acidity in the tank starts to break down the concrete. So it's just one of those things that if you're, you know, [00:05:00] you, you want to make sure you're getting it checked every once in a while if you're a homeowner.

Tracy: Let's talk about that. Okay. Because when you get your septic tank pumped does not mean they're inspecting it.

Tego: They're just

Tracy: pumping it. They're not going to tell you that it's got a problem unless you ask, right? They're not doing an inspection. That's two separate things, pumping versus inspection. So on inspection, now newer tanks have two openings, front of the tank, the back of the tank and inspectors are required to open both sides.

You know, if you're just going to have it pumped, they're going to just open one, pump it out and, and call it good, right? They're not going to look to make sure that everything's flowing properly in any event, you know for those people that have septic tanks, they probably already know this Tego, but caring for your septic tanks, pretty important.

So some of the don'ts with the septic tank, right? Most people with septic tanks don't have a garbage disposal. They don't want to put extra things in that tank, right? Like Sewer line. Great. You [00:06:00] know, grind up those things in your garbage disposal. But for septic tanks, most people don't even have one in their kitchen sink.

They just don't want to get all that extra stuff in their tank. Grease. I've, I've heard, you know, you don't want to get a lot of grease down there and get it in your tank. It's like a biome. It's like your gut, right? It's, it's got its own bacteria that helps break everything down. So along with that, Not putting like a lot of bleach or using a lot of antibacterial products, which I would assume that during those years where we were using a lot of hand sanitizers and a lot of disinfecting products that a lot of the septic tanks, probably their biome got messed up a little bit.

Tego: So if you're, if you're a buyer, you're, you're looking at a house, do you want to buy a house? And it has a septic tank. What do they need to be thinking about?

Tracy: So just learning about septic tanks, really, you know, I mean, it's a, it's not a very sophisticated thing generally some of those engineered ones that [00:07:00] we have to put into Harris or where there's a lot of granite or steep slopes are a little more technical,

Tego: small

Tracy: lots have an engineered system so that they're not, they, they need that space for the liquids to be flown out, but yeah, so.

Really, it's, it's learning about and making sure you don't throw paper products unnecessarily, sanitary products, things that, you know, you don't want to put a lot of stuff down there that isn't going to decompose readily. And remember that an inspection is different than getting it pumped, but get it come pumped.

We just had one couple of weeks ago where they said septic tank pumping, it's, we've been here 10 years. We've never pumped the septic.

Tego: Yikes.

Tracy: Yeah. So anyway, that's, that's the scoop on the poop Tego.

Tego: Ah, you did it. Thank you. Thank you.

Tracy: Next topic.

Tego: We've got to talk about it. It's all in the news. It's all over the place.

Of course. In our world, you know, basically real estate professionals, it's this, this big lawsuit, this [00:08:00] settlement that, that broke last Friday. And wow, I cannot believe that there's Tracy, I, I posted this and you probably saw it on my Facebook was this thing called the, the gal man, amnesia effect. You ever heard of that?

Nope. And I didn't see it. Oh, you didn't. Oh man, there you go. See, she doesn't even follow me on Facebook. It's not true. It's the, it's a phenomena. Of people trusting news for topics, which they are not knowledgeable about Despite recognizing them to be extremely inaccurate on certain topics on which they are very knowledgeable about That one hit me big time Over the weekend with all the news reports about this n.

a. r national association settlement regarding this lawsuit about about commissions and I, I, I don't want to get into weeds too far in this. I know you don't want me to get into weeds on this too far. However, I think consumers need to know that there's been tons and [00:09:00] tons of really, really poor reporting on this, on, on what's going on.

And one of the things that, that seems to be getting repeated over and over again is that commissions are, were mandated how much we're charged by the, the association, which is, you know, I mean, it's just, that's just a flat out lie. Now, do a lot of people, realtors, brokers charge a similar amount and have for years?

Yes. Does some charge lower amounts? Absolutely. Does some charge higher amounts? Absolutely. And, and let me just break this down and really what, what people need to know. If this goes through, which is not settled yet, but if this goes through, come July a, a buyer looking to buy a house is going to make an agreement with a buyer broker or realtor, and they're going to decide on what that buyer broker is going to get paid to serve that buyer.

That's different from what we've done in the past. And then at the same time, the [00:10:00] seller is still going to work with their listing agent to decide what the listing agent is going to get paid to serve them on their home. And that's a little bit of a, I'm going to call it a disconnect from what we've done in the past, where it was the seller would, would decide if they were going to help out the buyer broker and pay them help cover the buyers.

Brokers cost the seller would pay it and that was decided up front. That's what's going away but the seller can still you know pay for the buyer brokers a fee if they feel like that You know something you want to do to help help put the deal together because the the challenge is there's a lot of buyers That have no money Let me rephrase that.

They

Tracy: have enough to buy a

Tego: house. Right. Maybe they're a little strapped for cash. And so, you know, that was the thing. Now, is this going to open up a lot more [00:11:00] negotiations in real estate deals? Absolutely. That's, that's one of the big changes is that there'll be a lot more negotiations in, in the real estate deal, both on what brokers get paid and how they get paid.

And even up to the time of when you're, you know, doing contract negotiations, you'll be also probably negotiating what the, the brokers get paid and how they get paid. So. Lot to unwrap there. And I, again, I could get in the weeds on that, but I don't want to, but that's really what people know. It's just kind of separating the, the representation and how people get paid.

Tracy: Okay. Thanks for that. Tego, can we talk about some homes?

Tego: Yeah. I

Tracy: mean, this is the real estate Albuquerque real estate show. Two houses went on the market. Hot off the press one, one, two, three, one Mira Vista place Southeast. That is near. Southeast sort of by four, four hills, it's Southern and want to [00:12:00] bow Southern and yeah, Southern and want to bow.

So it's a neighborhood sort of a variety of townhomes right there. And this one just came on the market. It's going to be open Saturday, 11 to one. So if you want to see it, hurry over there, 11 to 1 1 1 2 3 1 Mira Vista Place, Southeast 87123. 270, 000. It's a three bedroom, two bath, two car garage nice single story house.

It's got a monthly fee for the Homeowners Association of about 140, 000 for a month. But you know, really great location, especially if you work in Southeast Albuquerque Bay on the base or you know, private businesses there, whatever. So that one is open 11 to one Saturday. We also have another one, two blocks south of UNM, right at university and silver.

Silver, yeah. 1721 Silver Avenue Southeast listed for 319 nine. And that one [00:13:00] is, yeah, two blocks away. So it's a two bedroom. One garage space, really cute, cute house with the original wood floors. It has a basement area with some, you know, kind of has some versatility of how you might want to use that space if you need office or something like that.

So 1721 silver Southeast. Call us right away if you want to see either of these houses at 448 8888 and we'll get you in. Yeah, they're pretty exciting. I love, love those properties, those

Tego: price points, anything in the 300, 300 under low 300 is a rarity these days because just, you know, what, what's happened with price appreciation over the last two, three years.

So yeah, definitely. Yeah.

Tracy: I'm going to mention one other that we have now that it's warming up. I know it's been on and off warming up for the last couple of weeks. 7405 San Juan court Southwest, like San John J O N. [00:14:00] Southwest it's 514, 900 and it has a swimming pool. So if you're looking for a swimming pool for the summer coming up look at this property.

It's listed at 514 nine. It's a five bedroom house. Three bathrooms, three car garage Southwest Heights. So 7405 San, I say San Hon, San Hon, but J O N port Southwest San Hon. Anyway, call us if you want to see that one, if you're ready to have your own swimming pool. You got it.

Tego: Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Let's talk about what are the hot zip codes in Albuquerque right now tracking this week in the, in the market.

In, in, in what I look at when I'm doing this is we look at supply versus demand, good old supply versus demand. You know, what, what areas have the. You know, are more favorable for homebuyers and what are more favorable for home sellers in the sense of, you know, tight supply in, in versus demand. [00:15:00] So a higher numbers indicate that it's much closer to a seller's market.

So the hottest markets from a seller's market standpoint right now in Albuquerque is eight seven one one two. And, and that's

Tracy: near, near northeast, sort of like

Tego: little town. Yeah, a little bit more moderately priced, you know, homes in that area. But the next one is a 7111, which is far northeast heights, all the way up to the foothills, all the way up to high desert tramway.

Or not tramway. I'm sorry. Yeah, but through tramway and Spain, Tabazon or what did I say? Yeah, I don't know where I don't know where that came from. But anyway, Tanawan, I was thinking about Tabazon and Durango for some reason. And then I said

Tracy: anyway,

Tego: yeah, so, so

Tracy: eight, seven, one, one, one.

Tego: And then 87121, which is west side.

And again, a little bit more moderately priced [00:16:00] 87109 is next. 87114, which is west side. And, and so

Tracy: 87109 is kind of the Del Norte high school area. Yep. There we go.

Tego: And then if we go through the list. It, you know, it kind of goes down, but what we're finding is just about every market in Albuquerque is still indicating as a seller's market.

Of course, these are averages, not every home, you know, not every neighborhood. It's, it's, it's very dependent. But the markets that are not quite as strong that are closer to a buyer's market are the Edgewood market, 870, yeah, it's a, it's a more balanced 87015 Sandia Park also in the East mountains, 87047 Perales.

I found that interesting, but Corrales is by far the most expensive. No, I take that back. A7

Tracy: 1 2

Tego: 2. A7 1 2 2. Sandia Heights. Sandia Heights is more expensive. But, you know, it's one of the more expensive markets. There's not a lot of [00:17:00] homes. You know, if you look at Corrales right now, there's maybe 20 homes in entire market, I guess, I'm just guessing, but so it's interesting, you know, and it's, it's one of those things when people say, well, is it a, it is a buyer's market or is it a seller's market?

And I said, well, it depends. And I'm, I know that's a cop out answer, but it's true. It's that depends on the price point. It depends on the part of town. It depends on the age of the home. It depends on, you know, what side of the street it sits on. You know, when you're talking about specific homes, so but for the most part, we're still in a seller's market.

Tracy: I have some other stats.

Tego: Okay. You have stats.

Tracy: Different topic. Okay. New subject.

Tego: You're stealing my thunder.

Tracy: Yeah. Well, don't worry. I won't, I won't be posting like market updates online on your YouTube channel or anything. So just, just to kind of throw out one week in our multiple listing service.

One week back, we've had 284 new listings, new properties come on the market and this is residential 284 came on the [00:18:00] market. 243 properties went pending sale in the past week. 166 of the properties on the market have had a price reduction in the last week. So when you're talking about pricing a home, What you price it at really does matter.

Even if it's a seller's market, if it's overpriced, it might need price reductions until it gets into the right price where a buyer feels like the price is right for that house. The price is right. That sounds like a great TV show. We have 64 properties in what we call coming soon status, meaning they're in the hopper, they're not ready to be shown yet.

The broker has put them out there on multiple listing service saying, Hey, these are coming. These do not go out to the public. Only the realtors can see them in our multiple listing service. So if there is something you're looking for, there are 64 coming soon listings that are not yet out on Zillow or Trulia or realtor.

com, all those different websites. So that's where, you know, give [00:19:00] us a call and make sure that we're watching that for you. 54 properties in the last week fell out of contract. They were under contract and something happened and they came back on the market. So I just thought it was kind of interesting because new listings 284 under contract during the week 243.

That doesn't mean it's of the 284. Those are all the properties that are in our multiple listing service. So things are still coming on the market. Things are still getting under contract and we're still seeing closings. So,

Tego: so just, just to. Put a bow on what you were just talking about. Everything you just said is very normal for this time of year.

This is none of that was like, oh my gosh, there was that many price reductions. It's very normal. It, you know, oh my gosh, there was that many deals that fell through. No, that's very normal. This is all normal stuff. And, and right now what I'm tracking from a big picture standpoint is. You know, we're starting to get a little bit more, you know, homes coming on the market, like you just said, we're, but we're still [00:20:00] seeing a steady stream of, of buyers out there looking for homes.

Tracy: We definitely are. There are buyers looking, you know, the 166 that went closed in the last week. Our listeners probably know that a lot of people want to close on their new home at the end of a month, right? So it wasn't last week, wasn't the end end of the month. We're in the end of the month right now.

So at end of month, why do people want to close at the end of the month? Well, one, they probably have housing through the end of a month. If they're renters or even if, you know, if they're owners somewhere, most people have housing through the end of the month, so they don't necessarily want to pay for.

Two houses at the same time, rent and a new mortgage at the same time. So they like to close at the end of the month. The other reason is because when you close early in the month, you pay interest on your new loan for all the days left in that month. So your closing costs are a little bit higher. The, the.

The earlier in the month [00:21:00] you close. So a lot of people push it so that their amount to bring to closing is a little bit less. Yeah.

Tego: In the end, it's the same amount of money. It's just the way it's calculated. Pro tip, Tracy. If you're selling your home, if you're buying a home and you're doing contract negotiations, don't schedule your closing for the last day of the month.

Don't schedule your closing for the last couple of days of the month because you're, you're everybody else's as well. And you're, you're setting yourself up for extra, Just, but you're, you're increasing the odds that something is going to go sideways.

Tracy: Well, and don't, don't schedule your closing, your final purchase for the day.

You absolutely have to be in that house and out of wherever else you're living because sometimes things get delayed. And if you've given yourself a little buffer, a little crossover or carry over, you're going It's a lot less stressful. It's stressful enough. So, yeah, what,

Tego: what happens [00:22:00] is since, since, you know, a lot of closings and or signings as we call them here in New Mexico happen, you know, at the end of the month, all the title companies, all the lenders, everybody's crunched at that, at that last week of the month.

So if you can, you know, put it back like one week, you're going to put your three days. I mean, just put yourself in a much better position. All right. There's been a lot of talk of the lock in effect in housing, and, and we'll go into what that is here in a second, but, and many of you probably know this because we've talked about it before, but there was a study done now by FHFA, which is the Federal Housing Finance Authority, yeah, the

Tracy: agency,

Tego: yeah, they, they're Fannie and Freddie basically, and, and so they wanted to know how many homes did not sell Because people are in these low interest rates and they're not too motivated to get rid of their 3 and 4 percent mortgage to get an 8 percent or 7 percent or, you know, high 6 percent mortgage.

So what did they find?

Tracy: Oh, Tico, I want to jump right to the answer. But [00:23:00] first, let's talk about, you know, there's the, the lock in limits. It really, you know, has made it a little less flexible for people who want to sell and buy, right? Because the house price is more and the interest rate is now more. We did talk about you know, people assuming mortgages last week.

So if you want to know more about that, go back and listen to two weeks ago when we talked about assumable mortgages. But. Higher rates reduce the probability of home sales they found by 18. 1%. So that's pretty significant. They say that in Q4 of 2023, mortgage rate lock in caused a 57 percent reduction in home sales with fixed rate mortgages.

That's huge. Yeah. In one quarter, 57 percent didn't sell their house because of their mortgage. I don't know how they found this out, but between Q2 2022 and Q4 of 2023, 1. 33 million sales were [00:24:00] prevented due to mortgage rate lock in.

Tego: So we talk about 2023 was one of the slowest home sales years on record, and that's what some of the people that are pointing to, you know, a housing crash, a housing bubble, blah, blah, blah.

Well, there's a reason. I mean, people, it wasn't that people didn't want to move, but they looked at the numbers and said, well, that doesn't make any sense. I'm going to get a less expensive house with maybe a smaller house and my payment's going to be higher. So like all the downsizing that we've been kind of expecting, just it didn't happen in the last year and a

Tracy: half.

Yeah. So what they said was mortgage rate lock and leads to people not living in their preferred homes. Inflate inflates prices prices and worsens affordability.

Tego: Yeah. So there we go. Good. But speaking of mortgage rates, let's just wrap on, on this this week, Tracy. Well, no, I've got another story we got to talk about that Rio Rancho story.

It was pretty interesting, but mortgage rates, we had a little bit of good news this week on mortgage rates. We've [00:25:00] been hovering around this 7 percent range, you know, when they when they just kind of look at the across the board. And now it's it's back down into the high sixes again. That's for.

You know, perfect credit, good down payment, all that stuff. Right. I'm just saying that's, you know, what you're getting. So mortgage rates are a little bit better, a little bit better. There are some people projecting them to go even lower. Well, the fed

Tracy: announced, you know, that they're still planning to do some rate cuts on the fed rate, which isn't exactly the same, but it does typically help with mortgage rates.

Let's switch to that story to go. Okay. Okay. So the story came out and I don't know the hometown register, but single family housing by location. So it was saying the, the number of single family homes state by state and what states rank with the most single family and the least single family. So like the percentage,

Tego: the mix, like single family [00:26:00] versus multifamily, like apartments and.

Tracy: Exactly. Okay. That's exactly it. So what we, what we probably could all guess is the state with the lowest number of single family homes is New York. You know, you think about New York City, Manhattan, all the boroughs and all the multifamily they have there makes New York. But

Tego: you think about upstate New York, how rural it is, very rural.

So I don't know. I mean, I guess it's. I guess it's just New York City is so dominant in the demographic,

Tracy: right? It makes

Tego: sense. Yeah. So

Tracy: New York is the only state in which single family homes account for less than 50 percent of the total. Interesting. But the reason we love this story is because as you go through it and you're going, okay, so here's some of the states that have.

The most single family units of 70 percent or more Idaho at 78 Iowa at 78 percent in Kansas at 78 percent leading the way, but then you go in the story goes on and it says [00:27:00] the, the Rio Rancho is one of those that has over 90%. There's only a few cities. That are over a hundred thousand people, which I don't know that Rio Rancho, but they're looking at Albuquerque and they say, I think it's

Tego: just around that if I recall about a hundred.

Yeah,

Tracy: so they said they're saying that Rio Rancho has over 90 percent single family homes, which is true. There are not a lot of apartment buildings, multifamily in Rio Rancho. There's a few. But not very many. Well, if you go,

Tego: if you go back, I mean, if anybody knows the history of Rio Rancho and the platting, how it was done back in the sixties and it's all, you know, a lot of it was just half acre, single family homes.

That's what it was built for.

Tracy: Yeah, but there's

Tego: not a lot of multifamily. There are some, but there are

Tracy: some, a couple apartment complexes. There's some fourplex areas. There's some active adult complexes that were built in the Loma Colorado area, not long ago, but in general, It's a single family city, so yeah.

So there you go. All right. So [00:28:00] enjoy your weekend. You know, next weekend is Easter. Good Friday. Then you know what next a week and a half Monday is Tico?

Tego: No.

Tracy: April fool's day. Start thinking now about your April fool's jokes and don't let people fool you on April fools. Well,

Tego: I, I get got every year. So I know, I know.

I kind of like it. I kind of enjoy getting got. Getting got we are the Venturi realty group with real broker here in Albuquerque. If you want to reach out to us, need any help with your real estate, just want to ask a question. If you've got questions about market, what's going on in a real estate market, I'm, I'm your guy.

I'm Chico Venturi and I'm with my cohost and business partner and life partner, Tracy Venturi. And we're at a five Oh five. 448 8888 here at our office in the North Valley. Thanks for listening everybody.

Albuquerque Housing Market 2024: Where Are Prices Now?

Albuquerque Housing Market 2024: Where Are Prices Now?

Albuquerque Housing Market 2024: Where Are Prices Now?

 

Hello, everyone!

I'm Tego Venturi from Albuquerque Real Estate Talk, and in today's piece, we're diving deep into the fabric of our city's housing market. Albuquerque has been witnessing some fascinating developments, especially with the advent of build-to-rent communities, and there's a lot to discuss concerning the current real estate trend wave.

New Developments in Albuquerque Real Estate

Firstly, let me share with you some details about the new housing projects taking shape in our beloved city. A notable one is a 10-acre parcel being transformed into a neighborhood of 90 standalone homes ranging from 850 to 1,070 square feet. Imagine sitting out on your front porch sipping your morning coffee or participating in communal gardening within internal courtyards — this is the kind of living experience that's being created right here in Albuquerque.

Then we have the Eleanor development by Unser Gateway Realty—a promising venture in partnership with Westway Homes featuring 126 single-family houses. With home sizes varying between 650 and 1,500 square feet and about 30 units anticipated to be ready within the next year, the diversity and availability of housing options are indeed looking up.

The Trend of Build-to-Rent

Now, let's talk about a trend that's gaining significant traction: building single-family homes for rent. This concept has blossomed into neighborhoods like The Bedrock at Tracy—a build-to-rent community comprising 199 townhomes and an additional 145 single-family homes. But why is this trend emerging?

In my analysis, the tightening of lending standards post the Dodd-Frank Act has played a pivotal role. It's changed the dynamics of homeownership and has paved the way for build-to-rent communities to fill a need in our market.

Housing Market Insights

As we've seen, housing affordability continues to be a challenge, with building new single-family homes under $300,000 becoming increasingly difficult. With the median home price hovering around $350,000, a family needs an income surpassing $100,000 to afford these prices comfortably—a figure not attainable for everyone in our city.

Since late 2019, home prices have risen by roughly 50%, with mortgage rates fluctuating, adding another layer of complexity for potential homeowners.

Rental Properties and Market Accessibility

On the rental side, we've launched a new tool, nmhomerentals.com, aiming to streamline the search for rental properties while cracking down on scams. Despite a common misconception, institutional investors are not the primary rental property owners—it's typically small-scale, individual investors that hold this market segment.

The real challenges to housing affordability lie in the administrative and regulatory terrain—issues like zoning, planning, and permitting. It's critical to have informed discussions around these topics, rather than pointing fingers at large corporations who, contrary to belief, are not the root cause of the problem.

Navigating Real Estate Commissions

In our episode, Tracy and I also touched upon the proposed changes to real estate commissions in New Mexico. Under the current system, the seller effectively covers the buyer broker's commission, but this might soon change, with buyers directly reaching agreements with their brokers regarding payment. Although this could introduce new paperwork and procedural changes, it's important to remember that real estate fees are always open to negotiation.

Reflections and Market Stability

In the midst of these shifts, I've felt an overwhelming sense of satisfaction in assisting our clients with their real estate journeys. The Albuquerque housing market has maintained stability with consistent price appreciation and a relatively low number of available homes—promising signs for both buyers and sellers.

As the seasons change, we expect an uptick in listings, so buyers, keep your eyes peeled for that perfect home, and sellers, get ready to showcase your property's charm.

For anyone navigating the Albuquerque real estate waters, the Venturi Group is here to steer you in the right direction. Feel free to reach out to us at 505-448-8888 for guidance or to discuss your property needs. We're more than just your realtors; we're your neighbors in this vibrant community. Let's make your real estate dreams a reality together!

 

Tego Venturi:
This week on Albuquerque Real Estate Talk, episode 484, end of March 2024, we're gonna we have to talk about the National Association of Realtors settlement agreement regarding commissions and all that stuff and tons of news on that. So we'll get into that. What really what buyers and sellers need to know, Tracy, as well as a lot of lot more in in a good way, talk about housing affordability and solutions there. Now, Tracy, you have a story about some new construction coming to Albuquerque, some single family homes, but there's a twist on that. So we're gonna get into that. And just a couple other things. Of course, we'll probably go down the rabbit hole and get off on some other stuff too, Tracy. Plenty plenty of stuff in the real estate world this week in Albuquerque.

Tracy Venturi:
Absolutely. So where do you wanna start?

Tego Venturi:
Start how people can get a hold of us.

Tracy Venturi:
Sure. So we're Venturi Realty Group of Realty Broker, and, the best way is our phone, 505-448-8888. That's an easy one. We should have a jingle. 448-8888. Or, you know, welcomehomeabq.com online. You can check out our website and reach us through that as well.

Tego Venturi:
I you know, I wanna start with housing affordability. Not not affordable housing. That's a different conversation. I'm talking about housing affordability. Housing affordability is the issue of our time, I think. Now I'm a little biased because I'm a housing wonk. I believe in housing. Everybody needs a place to live.

Tego Venturi:
And we have a housing problem. There's been a gazillion studies, you know, analyzing how many homes were short in the United States, in Albuquerque, in New Mexico, everywhere. Right? And the the challenge is right now to build a new single family home, it's almost impossible now to build anything that could be sold as new for $300,000 and under.

Tracy Venturi:
In Albuquerque area, in our metro Realty.

Tego Venturi:
Honestly, in the country. I've heard that everywhere. I mean, I'm sure there's some places maybe, but it it's it's it's a real challenge.

Tracy Venturi:
You're being very serious, Tego, but all I heard was wonk. I don't know that word, wonk and kazillion, a kazillion stories.

Tego Venturi:
A kazillion. You know?

Tracy Venturi:
You you stopped me at wonk.

Tego Venturi:
Wonk. Wonk as in, like, I follow this stuff, and I'm very passionate about it. And I really get in the weeds on trying to figure out how to, you know, bring these solutions forward that that are gonna help the affordability challenge.

Tracy Venturi:
Right. So this week, there was a lot of news, right, about what it, what an income needs to be in our market to be able to buy, average median priced home?

Tego Venturi:
Well, median price is now around 350 in Albuquerque.

Tracy Venturi:
Yeah. And so what what that equates to as far as an income for a household is now over a 100,000 to be able to afford that house. Yeah. And it seems like pre pandemic, that was significantly less. What the the, rate that I think somebody's I saw somebody's stat. I think it was in the 50,000 or 59,000 or something was the income needed to buy the average price home, average median. Yeah. Yeah.

Tracy Venturi:
And now it's over a 100. So, yes, it's changed a lot because of interest rates, because of home prices. Everything combined together made it significantly different for affordability.

Tego Venturi:
Well, let's just go back to pre pandemic. Home prices in Albuquerque have gone up about 50% since, let's say, 2019. Right? End of 2019. Not not double, but, you know, half of double.

Tracy Venturi:
Right.

Tego Venturi:
Is that right? No. That's not quite right. Anyway, 50%. So so home prices have gone up. On top of that, we went from again, pre pandemic, we were kind of in the 4, 4 and a half percent range on mortgages. And then when the pandemic hit, you know, we had that unbelievably low mortgage rates there where people were getting under 3%.

Tracy Venturi:
Especially if they did, like, a 15 year, which many people did

Tego Venturi:
Right.

Tracy Venturi:
Because the monthly payment was still so affordable on a 15 year at a 2.875 or whatever.

Tego Venturi:
Right. And then and then what happened is, you know, we had this price appreciation, and then we had mortgage rates go up to over 8% at one point. Now they're more they're hovering right around 7% right now, plus or minus, you know, in in that range, which is better than 8. However, it's really put a strain on people's affordability. And and we're talking about purchase, but there's also rent.

Tracy Venturi:
Right.

Tego Venturi:
You know, every type of housing is more expensive. Every type of housing is a much larger portion of everybody's budget than it used to be. And, of course, everything else is a lot more expensive too. So there's definitely been some some Tracy.

Tracy Venturi:
So that brings up 2 topics.

Tego Venturi:
Well, I've got one, but you go ahead.

Tracy Venturi:
Well, one of them is the multiple listing service, the Realty association that has a website to help with people find real rentals that are available, that are authenticated, that it's really the person renting it using this site. So you're not gonna get scammed by somebody pretending to be the owner or the rental manager.

Tego Venturi:
Yeah. So last year yes. So let's talk about that. Last year, the we we at the Southwest MLS, we added a product that that basically aggregates all the different rental properties for the most part in the whole metro Albuquerque area. You can visit that website atnmhomerentals.com. And so it combines property managers and rental properties they have. It combines even individual private owners that want to post their their properties for rent and any rentals that are in the multiple listing service, which isn't a lot, but it takes it all in one place so that a consumer can go there again, nmhomerentalsdot com, and see a really good, cross section of everything that's available.

Tracy Venturi:
Right. And so there might be Tego, some of our listeners might have rental properties, and they don't know this resources out there. They can get, go through the process to be legitimized as the owner of a property, and they can use this site to put their property for rent.

Tego Venturi:
Yeah. And a lot of people may not realize this, but the the rental scams on places like Craigslist, Facebook Marketplace, you know, these free listing services, the scams are just out of control, and it's really sad. You know, we've had situations where we we've talked to people that thought they were putting the deposit down on a property and putting the 1st month rent down on a property. They sent it off, you know, they wired it off to somebody and that money was gone. Never seen again. Probably somebody overseas. Right?

Tracy Venturi:
Well and it it's gotten worse than that. We've had people literally meet people with keys to properties, like, in person who aren't the real property managers or owners. Anyway, so that's one thing. Right?

Tego Venturi:
Yeah. That that's again, the I mean, I know we're having a conversation about affordability. Right. But it's also part of that is just accessibility to properties that are available.

Tracy Venturi:
Right. Totally. Problem

Tego Venturi:
Right. For the rental side in Albuquerque. Yeah.

Tracy Venturi:
Totally. So that's great. I really appreciate that the Realtors Association put that out there because, you know, it it costs them money

Tego Venturi:
to

Tracy Venturi:
to, have that. So we appreciate that they're doing that.

Tego Venturi:
Okay. Can I just say I was very involved in making this happen, and I'm very proud of it? And I've heard some people pooh pooh ing, and I'm like, you know, there's always gonna be your people that are detractors. But I'm sorry. This is this is for the community because it was broken. It was so bad if you're trying to find a rental property.

Tracy Venturi:
So hard. We'd get calls all the time from people moving to Albuquerque or the metro area. They don't know the area, and they need help finding a rental. And we are like, I'm so sorry. There isn't one place that I can direct you. There there just wasn't, and now there is one place that we can direct people.

Tego Venturi:
And Well, you can go to Craigslist. Good luck. Watch out for

Tracy Venturi:
this house. Careful.

Tego Venturi:
Yeah.

Tracy Venturi:
Yeah. So this is great. It's great if you own some property and you wanna use it for your rental site because that's part of what it's good for. You don't have to be a real estate professional to list your property there.

Tego Venturi:
Remember how at the top of the show, I said, we'll probably go down some rabbit holes?

Tracy Venturi:
That was one.

Tego Venturi:
That was 1, but it was really good. I mean, it's good information. I think the community needs to more know more about this resource. Again, it's nmhomerentals.com.

Tracy Venturi:
Speaking of rabbits, you know, it's Easter weekend, so it's very appropriate that you would say rabbit hole, just this show. Anyway, so, Tego, the other part of where we were going on affordability, units, properties coming online. Right?

Tego Venturi:
Well, I I wanna I wanna hit on let me let me take this another direction just a little bit. I posted something about a week ago on my Facebook. Again, it's Tego Venturi if you wanna follow me. I pretty much just post a lot of housing stuff, housing stat, housing news.

Tracy Venturi:
You don't post pictures of your family and your vacation and your dogs

Tego Venturi:
I don't know.

Tracy Venturi:
Post pictures of

Tego Venturi:
of yeah. I know. I I just don't. I just don't. Anyway, the the thing with affordability, there's been this this kind of story kind of out there that that all the Wall Street, big investors are buying all the single family homes, and that's why we have an affordability problem.

Tracy Venturi:
Right.

Tego Venturi:
And I just couldn't take it anymore. And so I put together a long post that breaks down how many homes in the country and in New Mexico are owned by investors like institutional investors versus the mom and pop investors. And the short of it is most rental properties are owned by the mom and pop investor, basically, you know, 10 or less properties. And they're they're and and a lot of them are people where this is their, like, retirement fund. Right? You know, maybe it was their their home they had and they moved. They kept it. Now it is their nest egg.

Tracy Venturi:
Right.

Tego Venturi:
Right? And so the the the the problem I've had with it is the scapegoating of blaming, you know, the evil Wall Street people for the housing affordability problems when it is yeah, maybe it's an issue, but it is minuscule compared to the other things that can be done. And what's happened just this week, for some reason and maybe it's just my bubble because I follow all these housing econ people. Everybody's freely saying it's like, look, blaming the Airbnb, blaming the Wall Street investor, you know, buying all the houses. Okay. That's great. But that's that's easy for politicians to do is to, you know, blame some evil corporation that's doing all this bad stuff when the real problem is zoning, planning, permitting, infrastructure, ridiculous regulations on on building. I saw a story. Again, this is just anecdotal, but, you know, this this person, he's he's trying to build these townhomes, and he's, like, just about done.

Tego Venturi:
And he's trying to get his CO, his certificate of occupancy. And and the city will not let him do it until he puts in the sidewalk in the front required. And for for whatever reason, he couldn't do it in a timely manner, and they would not let him move forward until that was absolutely done. Cost him an extra $100,000, and it it cost him an extra 3 months. So this is the type of thing that's broken housing. And the the scapegoating, you know, these evil companies is not solving the problem. And it looks like people are finally starting to break away from that that narrative and call it out what it is, is this is a local problem. It's not a national problem.

Tego Venturi:
It's really hard for national to do it. It has to be done at the local level. Okay. I'm done. I'll fill my cell box.

Tracy Venturi:
Great. So let's change gears. So let's talk about I love

Tego Venturi:
it when you do this to me.

Tracy Venturi:
Let's talk about

Tego Venturi:
I have this big profound statement and you just go, oh, okay. Great. Let's go to something else. Sorry.

Tracy Venturi:
That was really awesome, Tego.

Tego Venturi:
Thank you.

Tracy Venturi:
Great job. Okay.

Tego Venturi:
Oh, and I got to say one more thing. If you believe that 44% of of homes got purchased by Wall Street Investors in 2023, you have been lied to, and I'm sorry you fell for it. That's all I gotta say.

Tracy Venturi:
K. We're gonna talk about the newest trend that we've talked about before, Tego. And we've put information out about it, and it seems to be happening more now, and that is build to rent. So there is a community in the North Valley.

Tego Venturi:
Speaking of affordability.

Tracy Venturi:
Speaking of affordability, these are homes being built to be rental properties. So, Jay Remby has one. It's called Griegos Farm. It's in the North Valley off Griegos, basically, between 12th and Rio Grande, and it's well underway. It's a beautiful master planned community with homes for rent. And it's a 10 acre plot. Right? And, you know, it's going up. They're building there.

Tracy Venturi:
It's a 10 acre area. They're 1 and 2 bedroom, homes, 850 to a 1,070 square feet. 90 freestanding homes on the 10 acres. But there's, you know, front porches, internal courtyards. There's all sorts of areas for community gardening. There's a pickleball court. I know that's really important these

Tego Venturi:
days. Hey. That is that is a thing these days.

Tracy Venturi:
That is. So they also have some offices where you can rent, you know, space there so you can have kind of a work, live. Even though you might only have an 850 square foot house, there are some spaces for the community to use. So those ones are well under construction. Last time I was overlooking it, I think there was some streets going in and and, you know, things going up. So, that's one of them, but we know that one was just announced this week in Rio Rancho. And last week on our show, we talked about Rio Rancho being one of the places in the whole country

Tego Venturi:
one of the highest in the entire country.

Tracy Venturi:
Right. Right up there. So Unser Gateway Realty, west side by Rust Hospital, They have, the Eleanor that was just they did the little groundbreaking with the whole row of men with shovels. Yep. I'm pretty sure there wasn't one woman with a shovel there.

Tego Venturi:
What's up

Tracy Venturi:
with that? Anyway, 126 homes in the Cabezon area. They're gonna be 650 to 1500 square feet, and these are homes being built to Venturi. Single family homes. Right? And they said 30 units will be ready in 12 to 15 months. This is a partnership with Westway Homes. JLM Living owned has purchased the land about 2 years ago, and they're finally getting to the point where they can say they did did a groundbreaking to start construction. And, you know, Westway Homes is one of our great local builders. They've been building in that, Diamante area, you know, rest hospital, very, southern end of Rio Rancho by Unser Yep.

Tracy Venturi:
In West Side Boulevard, just west of the hospital. They've been doing some building there as well as other areas of town. So, really excited to see how they've partnered with, Westway Homes to build this rent to or build to rent community.

Tego Venturi:
Right? And and when we say build to rent in in this context, it's obviously build to rent apartments has been around forever. But this this concept of building single family homes to rent is been huge actually for the last 5 years in in other parts of the country. Right. You know, Phoenix, Atlanta, Dallas, Houston, you know, some of those big cities. And now it's it's here in Albuquerque. And other than that, there's the 344 units that are going to go in. Oh, did I steal your thunder?

Tracy Venturi:
You did. That's okay.

Tego Venturi:
Go ahead.

Tracy Venturi:
This was my story.

Tego Venturi:
Oh, man.

Tracy Venturi:
So so we That's

Tego Venturi:
my deal.

Tracy Venturi:
We talked a long time ago, Tego, on the radio show and podcast that this was happening around the country and that it was destined to come here. And, yes, there is the Bedrock at the Tracy that's also built to rent. It's a little bit different. They're going to have a 199 townhomes and a 145 single family homes, and it's a big parcel, 37 acres. The trails, for those of you who don't know, it's by Volcano Vista High School, the whole cluster where they've got, by Ventana Ranch, West Albuquerque out at the end of Paseo del Norte, kind of between Montano and Paseo del Norte out on the west side Yeah. At the Tracy. So, those ones are under construction as well.

Tego Venturi:
Yeah. That that's all coming. I I just, again, getting back to this housing affordability thing. I I, again, I read all this stuff and listen to all this stuff. I I I heard an interesting analysis, and there's a lot of people that are are vilifying these build to rent investors. Again, the whole Wall Street, you know, they're evil. They're taking away all the homes. Why don't they build them for people that can buy? Well, it's it's really a a supply and demand thing.

Tego Venturi:
There's demand for rental houses that are single family homes for rent. There's a shortage of those. Part of that and this is this was the the take that I heard, and I thought it was interesting is you go back to 2,000 and, I guess, with 2,009 when they passed the Dodd Frank Act. So if you're not familiar with Dodd Frank, Dodd Frank was the the thing that came out of congress that was after the big the great recession. Right? And, you know, all the the crappy financing that happened pre housing recession 2,004 5 where they just loosened up the standard beyond belief and people were buying homes Realty that had no business buying a home.

Tracy Venturi:
Right.

Tego Venturi:
However, this this person's take was it swung the other way way too far. With with Dodd Frank, it tightened up the lending standard so tight that now there's people that are maybe they'd like to buy, but they're kind of on the margin, you know, debt to income wise. They're kind of on the margin maybe credit wise. Well, there's no products available for those people anymore, and they might be good homeowners. The problem is they can't get loans. And so now this person kind of hypothesis is this is why we see this proliferation of build build to rent neighborhoods because there isn't a product available for somebody that wants a single family home that, again, maybe they're on the margin, you know, credit wise, they can't buy.

Tracy Venturi:
Right.

Tego Venturi:
And I thought that was an interesting an interesting idea. I mean, you can agree or disagree with. That's not the point. I just thought it was an interesting take on on what's going on in the, housing economy. Alright, Tracy.

Tracy Venturi:
Alright, Tego. We boy, we've done some light

Tego Venturi:
heavy news today.

Tracy Venturi:
Yeah. Wow. I was gonna say we need to talk about, you know, some of the fun things going on in our community. Right? We've got some really awesome new home communities all over the city. I was thinking about the new development by Hoffman Towne Church in Northeast Albuquerque where they're selling homes there. So you're looking at new construction in the far Northeast. There are several options besides that Realty community. There's Stillbrook and there's some others.

Tracy Venturi:
So give us a call. We'd be happy to help you, with that new home purchase. You know, a lot of times people don't think of using a realtor to represent them when there's a new home builder involved. And, honestly, we we kinda know the ins and outs of it, and and it doesn't cost you anymore to have representation. So give us a ring if you're interested in that, and we'd be happy to help help you find the different opportunities of homes and home builders that might work for you.

Tego Venturi:
That's great. Yeah. K, Tracy. I know it's been some kinda heavy news. We've been talking a lot about affordability and the challenges. We we must talk about the National Association of Realtors, settlement agreement, that has to do with some lawsuits that have been floating around for about 4 years. And and you know, Tracy, I've been following them, like, you know, since the beginning.

Tracy Venturi:
So but we need to be clear. This is a proposal. This is proposed. Proposed settlement. Yep. And that in New Mexico, our purchase or our listing paperwork I wanna be really clear that in New Mexico, the agreement that we fill out when we go to list a home is very clear on how the commission is shared with a different realtor, which is different. A lot of states didn't have that. They didn't show how that whatever the broker is charging might be being shared with the other realtor.

Tego Venturi:
Let let's break down the way it is now, and and then we can also kind of go into how this is gonna look in the future for buyers and sellers. Right now, a seller agrees to sell a property, hires a real estate agent to a realtor to assist them with that. They agree on what that realtor, the listing agent is going to get paid. In that agreement, the listing agent also says, I'm gonna share part of what I'm charging with the realtor that brings the buyer to this house. Right. Right? So it's an incentive or just just like any other, you know, sales, you're incentivizing somebody to bring you a buyer on on this, in this case, a property. But, again, it's in any sales cut. That's basically the way it is now.

Tego Venturi:
The the the issue that really created the the the lawsuit was if if you're hearing this noise in the background, Tracy has her dog in our in our studio here, and he's, he's

Tracy Venturi:
he's having spring spring fever?

Tego Venturi:
He's he's having an allergy attack, if you can hear that. Sorry. Okay. Me get off get back on track. So, yeah, we gotta keep this light because this is kinda crazy stuff.

Tracy Venturi:
But the dog's keeping it light.

Tego Venturi:
Yeah. So, so okay. So that's the way it is. The the the let me get back to where I was going with this is the the the issue that that created the lawsuits, the issues that created the settlement without getting in going down that list of how it all came about because it doesn't matter at this point, is that the listing agent would say, okay. I'm guaranteeing to the whoever the buyer agent that brings a buyer, I'm guaranteeing that I'm going to pay them x amount. Right? And I wanna be clear. There's no set amount. Oh, we gotta talk about this.

Tego Venturi:
Can you believe how much poor reporting there has been and how so many people have no idea how organized real estate works, but yet they're writing national stories about it. Some of the stuff I've seen is just absurd. And, you know, stuff like the the the 6% requirement from the National Association of Realtors now going away. There's never been a requirement.

Tracy Venturi:
Right.

Tego Venturi:
I mean, do do a lot of people charge similar fees? Sure. Because that's that's what works in the

Tracy Venturi:
business model. Do a lot of, attorneys charge similar fees? Do a lot of other professionals charge similar fees? Yes. But there is no set fee structure in real estate.

Tego Venturi:
No. And there's a bunch of different business models that that don't charge

Tracy Venturi:
as much. And, you know, I could Or charge more.

Tego Venturi:
Or charge more. You can list them all off. Anyway, sorry. Just wanna make that clear. And and and then one one thing I've seen people say is, like, you know, we all say, well, commission fees are negotiable, and then people will say, well, my my my broker won't negotiate it. It's like, yes.

Tracy Venturi:
That's that's the negotiation.

Tego Venturi:
That that's that's what they charge. Could you go to another broker and do that? It's just like buying a car at one place versus the other. It's like, okay. That's what they charge. Okay. If you don't like that, go somewhere else. Right? And that's that's the negotiable part of it. Anyway.

Tego Venturi:
Alright. So back to what I was saying. Okay. Where where this is going with the big change is going to be instead of that guaranteed compensation to the buyer broker from the listing broker that goes away. Now the buyer will basically have a direct agreement with the buyer broker, and they will agree on what the buyer broker is going to get paid. K? So it it I've used this term and people said it's not correct. It's kind of decoupled The the seller paying or the seller basically portion of the proceeds helping pay for the buyer broker, where now the buyer broker and the buyer get to agree on what they get paid. There's so much more to it than that, but that's the simple the simple answer.

Tego Venturi:
And can sellers still incentivize a buyer broker bringing a buyer to their house? Absolutely. Can they still pay for the buyer broker? Again, that's one of the other things that's out there. Can the seller still pay for buyer broker's fee or, you know, professional fee? Absolutely. It just can't be guaranteed through the MLS system, and it it it must be negotiable, basically. And it but it can't be promoted in the MLS is is the real big change. Okay. That was in the weeds. Yeah.

Tego Venturi:
But that's the short of it. Yeah. And in in in right now, back to what you originally said, it's all proposed. Nothing for sure yet. There's gonna be a lot of changes. There's gonna be a lot of new paperwork in how we do things. There's gonna be extra steps, especially on the buyer side. Buyers are gonna have to get into agreement with a broker before they even go and see a home, which is very different than what we do now.

Tego Venturi:
But we're still a few months away on this at least, maybe, you know, till till July is what

Tracy Venturi:
we do. Get to keep talking about it for several more months.

Tego Venturi:
Of course.

Tracy Venturi:
Can we just talk about the llama I saw when I was out showing a house instead? You know, there are some really cool houses on the market right now, Tego, just to change it up a little bit.

Tego Venturi:
No. That's great. I know we've been Realty heavy this week, but it's just because that's what that's what the real estate news is served up.

Tracy Venturi:
I saw 1 mid mod house that was so cool, Tego. It made me wanna, like, have a mid mod house even though I love our house.

Tego Venturi:
Mid century modern.

Tracy Venturi:
Century modern, you know.

Tego Venturi:
What part of town?

Tracy Venturi:
It was in the UNM kind of Altura area.

Tego Venturi:
Yeah. Of course.

Tracy Venturi:
And it had, you know, the the the little triangle type windows with the pitched roof line sort of where you could just tell from the outside that it was a mid mod. Anyway, it was it was pretty it's pretty cool, but that's part of the fun stuff we get to do. You know, I was, showing a house, was last weekend. Sunday? Sun? I don't remember. Anyway, it was in outside Laguna, in Canyon Seto, 5 acres. And it was a beautiful day, and there was no wind. I've can't remember. I think it was last Friday afternoon, actually.

Tracy Venturi:
It was like a blue ribbon day. And I was out there, and I did not have time to stop for a Laguna burger, which really bummed me out. That's right.

Tego Venturi:
That's right. Yeah. You have to

Tracy Venturi:
You know? It's like I'm going right by, and I'm all by myself thinking I can do this. And then I ran out of time because we spent a lot of time looking at that property. But, anyway, that's the best part about what we do is helping people with their dreams, their home purchases, their home sales, and making great representation happen. So we appreciate you. There are a lot of open houses this weekend on Saturday. Sunday, not so much because it's Easter. But if you wanna reach out to us, 448-8888 is the best way.

Tego Venturi:
We didn't even talk about Albuquerque housing market status this week, and and that's fine. I'll do a deep dive here next week because we'll have the the March data and and get into that. I will just tell you that, you know, year over year price appreciation is still, you know, chugging along. We're not, you know the home price are still going up. We still have very low number of homes on the market, and and that really hasn't changed. So

Tracy Venturi:
We have quite a few coming on the market in our inventory personally. So if you're looking for something specific, give us a ring and maybe we know about it.

Tego Venturi:
Yeah. The the we do see okay. Now we gotta do the low markets. Normally, it's very normal this time of year, starting now, you know, into April, a surge in the number of people listing their homes. It's just this is that time of year. So if you're if you're a buyer, it's time to really start watching and thinking about it. If you're a seller, you gotta get ready now because, you want you wanna be hitting the market right now too as well. So that's it.

Tego Venturi:
Tracy, again, we're the Venturi Group Realty Broker here in Albuquerque, New Mexico. You can reach us at 505-448-8888. Take care.