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Video transcript:

Hey guys, I'm Steve. And this is the Steve Volkers Group, and this is September's market data update dump. I'm gonna try to keep it at 10 minutes. We'll see Kev. I don't know. I might be able to do it this this month. I feel like some of it might be possible, but we're using obviously August data Kev puts together this big book for us from our association, and then he chops it all up and we get lots of great.

Feel free to put a comment below in the video. If you want a copy of this, if you don't have a copy, we're welcome to send it to you each month. But this month I, I got this fancy new notebook, so I'm gonna use it cab, but. The topic of this month is don't chase the market. That’s what we talked about in our meeting…

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There’s a running joke amongst some real estate agents that many of us left the feeling of a comfortable salary and being told what to do by a boss, being chained to a desk or phone for 40 hours per week, only to become a real estate agent and work 24/7. Sure there are perks like building your own business, having no income caps, and enjoying flexible working hours but that comes with clients calling and texting you at all hours, other agents that you need information from that may not respond or be nice, 100 % commission only, all the license and access fees and of course getting paid last after all the hard work.

Television makes this job look so easy and glamorous. In reality, it is not. Some days I feel less like a realtor and more like a truck…

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When it comes to buying a home, there is a lot to think about. From the location, to how many bedrooms, to garage space, there are multiple factors to consider. How about buying an existing home versus buying new construction? We have lived in both an existing home and in a new construction home, and while there are definitely pros to both, I think it is important to highlight why new construction is a great option.

1. New construction homes are move-in ready.

While this may seem like a fairly obvious point, I think that it is an important one to reiterate. While an existing home may have some old charm, oftentimes, it does require some work, whether that be simply updating some outdated countertops or as costly as replacing an old roof. The…

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Video Transcript:

Hey, I'm Steve Volkers and we're the Steve Volkers Group. I think it's like a lair now. I feel like this is our like, like secret sauce lair but we are doing the July numbers in Grand Rapids, Michigan, which is basically Kent county. The data that we get from our association each month, big cab behind the camera puts together.

This booklet of information. It is data that is, is accessible by agents, but Kev puts all of his fancy spins on it, adds all kinds of math to it. And so then I get to spill out the information that Kev does with real life stories, working with buyers and sellers. So we have been talking about the market shift or last month, if you played along all the verbs or all the nouns or whatever, I'm not good…

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Download the Data PDF

Video transcript:

Hey, I'm Steve Volkers. This is the Steve Volkers group, which is my name kind of goofy. Right. But it's my company. So it's my name. We are talking market data and we're gonna talk, this is, uh, the July episode, but talking June to the past and we've been rolling with this Kev. I feel like we got a pattern going.

I talk too long, even though I'm gonna be sort of shorter every time in my mind, but there's always good things to talk about. This came out of just my 16 years of experience. A lot of people ask me about the market what's happening in residential real estate market in west, Michigan and economy and those kind of things.

And I just like keeping up with it. So, uh, Kev was like, we…

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Submitting an offer in a competitive market where you know there are multiple offers feels a bit like sending a racehorse to the starting gate and hoping for the best. Given that it is May and the Kentucky Derby takes place on the first Saturday in May followed by the Preakness just a couple of weeks later, I can’t help but notice the similar feelings and emotions. For the Kentucky Derby 20 three-year-old racehorses are loaded into a starting gate after years of careful planning and strategizing, only to let loose to run hopefully what will be their best race for what is known as the greatest two minutes in sports. 

Anyone that knows horseracing, knows the favorite horse doesn’t always win the race. There are many factors at play in these races:…

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Video transcript:

Hey, I'm Steve Volkers broker owner of the Steve Volkers group in Grand Rapids, Michigan. And this is our monthly market update. This is like three in a row Kev. This is pretty legit that we're actually making. What is it like if you got to do 90 days for a habit? So maybe we're, maybe we're making a habit here, but we are talking market data.

Feel free to watch the last two episodes, which sort of built into this month's data. First episode was really about the inventory shortage, still feeling the crunch of that. We talked a lot about new construction and the fact that new construction hasn't come online. To having that issue, which is what the big spike was in pricing over the last six months.

Then, we started talking…

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Hey, I'm Steve Volkers and it is the next month. And we started talking about sort of financials and what's going on in the real estate market in West Michigan, but also sort of nationally what's playing out, which then becomes local. So every month Kevin and I are just recording this video.

And so this might be a long one. I don't know. Cause it's just really my rambling and the stuff I find in my head just it's about the finances this time about, uh, what's happening in the marketplace. So I've got a couple of stories, and data to back that up. Um, last month, if you missed it, we did talk about sort of the inventory and where I felt that was coming from. Mostly, it was based on new construction, right? So there's a new construction lack, um,…

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Buying a house right now is not easy, there is no way to sugar coat that, but with a little bit of luck and a lot of math now is still a great time for many buyers to purchase. While many people will say sellers have the advantage in the market today, buyers today have a clear advantage over buyers who wait. 

First let’s talk about the math. I will use the interest rates from MSHDA (MI State Housing Development Authority) as their rates do not fluctuate daily for a conventional down payment assistance loan. As of March 24, 2022, the fixed rate for this loan was 4.625%. According to the Greater Regional Alliance of Realtors (GRAR), the average sale price of a home in the city of Grand Rapids was $245,188.00 in February 2022. For round numbers we’ll…

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Hey, I'm Steve Volkers with Steve Volkers Group in Grand Rapids, Michigan. A small local brokerage. And we are going to start just talking monthly about market data. So I use a lot of market data when I'm talking at listing appointments, buyer appointments, and just within our brokerage with our agents.

Kevin, our marketing guru is starting to throw together this, uh, real estate market data package. You can get all the data online and Kevin will probably throw up a link. But what we're going to do is just drop this once. With the newest data. And then I'm just going to do my overview of what I think is happening within the market.

Right. So I want to, just to dive right in today on some of these graphs that I find interesting and give you…

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