Idaho Housing Prices up Nearly 30 Percent!!!

Idaho appears to be leading the nation in housing cost increases.  I came across a story in my feed about a possible housing bubble.  From a left-of-center website known as Vox.  You can see the story at this link.  The writer is tracking real estate inflation.  It mentions CoreLogic, a site to which I subscribe, detailing a whopping 13 percent increase nationwide, year over year.  Then the following quote drives home the bad news from a buyer’s perspective in Idaho.

“Looking closer at different submarkets, it looks even more out of control: a 27.2 percent increase in Idaho, 20.4 percent in Arizona, 19.3 percent in South Dakota.”

Good grief!  Arizona at number two isn’t even within five percentage points of the Gem State.  And Arizona has been a popular refuge for retirees and snowbirds for decades.  Think the history of Scottsdale!

The writer doesn’t reach a conclusion on whether or not this is a bubble and about to burst.  The housing crisis that caused the Great Recession was due because there were too many homes.  Lenders were also on a binge and approved a lot of mortgages that traditionally would be rejected.  Today, there simply aren’t enough homes.

The story at Vox explains there’s a tremendous amount of buying of homes unseen.

One huge driver of the market in Idaho is one we’ve talked about before.  If you sell a home in Silicon Valley or Coastal Oregon, prices in Southern Idaho are still a bargain in comparison.  If you sell a home in California for three million dollars, you can pay 1.2 million dollars here and then bank the rest.  If you work from home you’ve done very well.  You get a great view from the den.  The drive down Blue Lakes Boulevard may frustrate locals but it’s a hop, skip and a jump compared to some coastal highways.

Which is to say the skyrocketing prices here may continue well into the future.  A severe recession could bring an end but most of us wouldn’t welcome an economy going off the rails.