"How's the real estate market?" everybody asks.  Often my answer is "It's all relative."

Real estate is selling, in fact we're having a busy spring market.  But what that means to you really depends on your situation.

I did a market analysis recently for a family who had owned a multi-family property for decades.  The property value probably wasn't quite as high as it might have been a few years ago.  And they asked me, "Should we sell?  Is this the right time to put our house on the market?" 

The family wanted to sell the house. They weren't interested in maintaining an investment property now that they were no longer local.  But they were getting tripped up on the idea that the value might have been higher a couple of years ago.  Momentarily I felt bad but then I realized Hey! it's all relative and you're in great shape in this market.

All I had to do was reflect on my own family's history. We too had a multi-family that my grandparents owned for some seventy or eighty years.  But we sold in the early 1970s - for about $35,000.  That Cambridge two-family is now worth something on the order of 20 - 25 times as much.  Our eighty years of ownership just happened to end a few decades too soon.  It's all relative.

So the answer to "How's the market?" really depends on each person's situation. The market seems very different to:

• The seller who bought in 2005 with a low down payment
• The seller who bought in 1998 who's been paying down her mortgage religously
• The seller who's owned his house for forty years but sent his kids to college by refinancing multiple times
• The seller who bought in 2000 but spent loads of money to get the fancy kitchen and baths of her dreams
• The buyer whose credit score used to be good enough but now is paying higher rates than his friends
• The buyer who keeps losing out on multiple bids
• The buyer whose offer is accepted on a short sale for a condo that sold for $125,000 more just a few years ago

It's one market - but it can feel very different to each buyer or seller.

So - How's your market?

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~

Check out my website for more information about the Cambridge real estate market.