Going on 4 months and still no luck at housing...what gives? (Plymouth: for sale, real estate)

[rambling homebrewer]

[SIZE=3]So I posted earlier asking for advice about places to look for housing of relocation. I thought I had some sounds suggestions. Well, I've been looking heavily since then and have found nothing. It is a brutal market there, with major shortages (according to my agent). Please tell me there is some sort of seasonal bias or something for real estate? I've looked in EP, Minnetonka, SLP, Plymouth, MG, etc etc etc etc. The houses I see in my price range 350-450K are really not very nice at all. Very rarely are they updated from when they were built, yet people are asking $155-170 a sq ft. Most need 80K in updates and 50% are pieces of junk that are non-starters, the others are just plain ugly. Am I just at a disadvantage since I cannot be there to pounce on a house in the first 5 minutes it is listed or do I need to start working with 25 realtors to put me on a pre-market strategy? It's been brutal. Now I am going to enter the "busy" season with all the other local buyers so further disadvantage is coming I feel. Is my only option building a new house with Pulte, Lennar or some other national builder? Or should I get an RV roam around nice neighborhoods and empty my chemical toilets into the sewers?[/SIZE]

[golfgal]

First--you are looking in the most expensive area of the metro and would need to add at least $100,000 to get into what it sounds like you want. Second-it's the middle of winter and most people don't list their house for sale now and typically what is on the market now is "leftovers" from the summer that no one else wanted either. If you can wait until late March/Early April there will be more inventory..but in that area, in your price range, the quality probably won't be any better.

[MnMomma]

It's a hard time to look since there isn't as much hitting the market. Some homes sell before getting on the MLS...so working with a good realtor is important...and one that works is your target area (which sounds like a too-wide area for this recommendation), and for one of the two big-name agencies is important (in my opinion). They often hear about something coming on the market before it goes live.

What are you hoping to get in your price range? (sq footage, age, etc..)

[wamer27]

My friend/client flips many homes and buys everything off market, I asked him how and he said it's very complicated but it works. Let me know if you'd like to talk to him, his father owns a real estate company also...

[rambling homebrewer]

Originally Posted by MnMomma

It's a hard time to look since there isn't as much hitting the market. Some homes sell before getting on the MLS...so working with a good realtor is important...and one that works is your target area (which sounds like a too-wide area for this recommendation), and for one of the two big-name agencies is important (in my opinion). They often hear about something coming on the market before it goes live.

What are you hoping to get in your price range? (sq footage, age, etc..)

I would be perfectly happy with 2000 sq ft- age is not too important if it is updated sufficently. (I live in a pre-war all brick house right that is 1100 sq ft finished). The issue I am seeing is in my price range they are all really much larger than that and are really not that nice.

[rambling homebrewer]

Originally Posted by golfgal

First--you are looking in the most expensive area of the metro and would need to add at least $100,000 to get into what it sounds like you want. Second-it's the middle of winter and most people don't list their house for sale now and typically what is on the market now is "leftovers" from the summer that no one else wanted either. If you can wait until late March/Early April there will be more inventory..but in that area, in your price range, the quality probably won't be any better.

[SIZE=3]Yes I'm holding out until then. I've looked at houses in the $500-650K range, that is why I settled on the other price range. Mostly it was a size issue. The houses in that range are monstrosities. I don't need 3500-5000+ sq ft. All I need is 3 bedrooms on one level, which is also a challenge given all the terrible 4 level splits I've looked at. I'm also fairly frugal in that I don't want my house payment to take my total debt to income ratio above 20% so anything over 550K is out. If I want to be fancypants, I will buy a vacation home somewhere warm to visit. [/SIZE]

[StanleyVegas]

Winter is a bad time to be looking, but in a couple of months it seems like you could find a 1800-2000 sq-ft older, prewar home that's already updated. You might have to come in closer to the core cities and your lot wouldn't be huge, but an old home that hasn't been let go might have better bones to begin with.

[golfgal]

Originally Posted by rambling homebrewer

[SIZE=3]Yes I'm holding out until then. I've looked at houses in the $500-650K range, that is why I settled on the other price range. Mostly it was a size issue. The houses in that range are monstrosities. I don't need 3500-5000+ sq ft. All I need is 3 bedrooms on one level, which is also a challenge given all the terrible 4 level splits I've looked at. I'm also fairly frugal in that I don't want my house payment to take my total debt to income ratio above 20% so anything over 550K is out. If I want to be fancypants, I will buy a vacation home somewhere warm to visit. [/SIZE]

Maybe you need to go down in price and then plan on doing some work on the place??

[rambling homebrewer]

Originally Posted by golfgal

Maybe you need to go down in price and then plan on doing some work on the place??

Yeah- I've also been looking at going that route as well but still people are asking almost the same per sq ft for stuff like that. I looked at a house on Friday last week that was 339K and it needed at least 100K in work, at least. I have no problem doing the work (my current house I have gutted and competely remodeled myself) but not for 339K. It was a non starter and after I was done it wouldn't have sold for more than 375K. I would have offered 250K max. So perhaps I need to offer what I think they are worth and see where that goes. Besides pissing everyone off....

[golfgal]

Keep in mind that housing prices in the Twin Cities are higher than you are used to so they might not be out of line with their asking price...