Is Now a Good Time to Buy a Southern Maryland Home?

A new year, a new home.  Is buying a home on your "to do" list for 2015?  Before you do so, you may want to ask: is now a good time to buy a Southern Maryland home?

The first thing you need to determine before you buy a Southern Maryland home is why exactly you are thinking about doing it right now.  Are you planning on having a family?  Do you want to move to a safer area?  Is your current home too crowded and you need more space?  Are you tired of paying someone else's mortgage (ie, renting) and want to own your own property that you can do with as you please?  Each one of these reasons is as valid as the other.  Deciding on the real reason behind your decision to purchase a new property will make it easier to focus on what to look for as well as where to look.

Every quarter, Pulsenomics surveys more than 100 financial experts to find out where they predict housing prices will be in the next five years.  They take the average of all answers they receive and create their Home Price Expectation Survey.  According to their most recent survey, these experts predict that home values will go up 4% by the end of 2015, with a cumulative appreciation of as much as 23.5% by the end of 2019.  Even the most conservative of the financial experts surveyed predict that we could see home values appreciate as much as 15.1% by the end of 2019.  So, if you plan on staying in your Southern Maryland home for the next five years, you may see a double digit increase in value.

Another aspect to consider when you ask if now is a good time to buy a Southern Maryland home is mortgage interest rates.  We have experienced the lowest interest rates in history over the past few years.  Currently, experts are predicting that they may go up to as high as 5% or more by the end of this year.  This is still well within affordable ranges.  However, if you hesitate too long, they may go up even higher in 2016.  The sooner you lock in a fixed rate mortgage, the better.

Is now a good time to buy a Southern Maryland home?  Only you can make that decision.  Take into consideration the reason you want to buy a home, where home values are headed and what mortgage interest rates are expected to do in the next few months.  Contact your Southern Maryland REALTOR® to talk about what is available on the market now.

Bonnie Augostino, your Southern Maryland real estate specialist

Originally posted on my Southern Maryland real estate blog here: http://bonnieaugostino.info/is-now-a-good-time-to-buy-a-southern-maryland-home/.