TIME TO TRADE UP?


Despite an improving economy and rock-bottom rates, inventory of available homes is inconsistent. Anything more than a trickle of listings sends prices down, causing sellers to pull their homes off the market. Then prices go up again because competition gets fierce, and sellers re-emerge. As a result, a bustle of trade-up activity is expected for this spring’s selling season, before conditions change again.

Other positive signs: new single-family housing starts are at a high since 2008, according to the Commerce Department’s latest report. Also, fewer homeowners are renting out their homes to delay selling them, down to 35 percent in 2014 from 39 percent in 2013, according to Redfin, a real-estate brokerage.

And more consumers have positive equity. Last spring, 19 percent of homeowners in Redfin markets (such as Atlanta and Philadelphia) had low or negative equity. That was down to 11 percent in November. Nela Richardson, Redfin’s chief economist, expects it to hit 8 percent by March 2015.

Even better for buyers, interest rates are near-historic lows below 4 percent. “The question of staying versus leaving is shifting. For people who were afraid to leave their mortgage because they thought it was the best they’re ever going to get, now there is another good mortgage around the corner,” Richardson says.