In The Midst Of A Pandemic, Why Are Home Sale Prices Skyrocketing?

When I think real estate, I definitely do not think “simple.” For me, buying a home just seemed to always come with an extra layer of bureaucracy [read: BS]. I never knew if the agent had my best interests at heart. I always thought the seller was hiding foundational cracks in the staging. As a result, I have probably participated in fewer real estate deals than I should have in my life. As an investor, I recognize this is an emotional, nonsensical thought process. There have been few moments in time better to buy real estate than in this COVID mess. People know it, too. In the middle of a pandemic where everyone is supposedly broke, home sale prices are at all time highs. Housing inventory is down more than 18% year over year because people are snatching up properties as fast as they can.

This is not what happened during the Great Recession of 2008. In that recession, housing prices dropped by around 33%. There are many reasons for the difference, but here’s an important one: Houses are much easier to buy these days.

Simplifying the Process

There are 2 ways to simplify the process of home buying:

• Buy your property in all cash; and
• Stay away from government programs.

This isn’t possible for a large number of buyers, especially first time homebuyers. The harsh truth is that you will probably have to deal with the bureaucracy of banks and government when you get involved in real estate.

Here comes tech to save the day. Before the advent of the Internet, potential buyers would have to sludge through the mortgage approval process over the phone and through in person meetings. You’d have to wait in physical queues if there were others ahead of you. You could only take offers in one by one, because you can only be in one place at one time. Add in an additional level of sludge if you are going through the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) or the Federal Housing Administration (FHA).

Offer comparison websites and the proliferation of the digital credit system simplified the process immensely. Credit reporting agencies spoke directly to bank agents, so approval was streamlined through the credit score. You could also field multiple offers from home, because the process had become standardized. As long as your score was above a certain level, the computers in charge of the process would release to you certain terms of engagement.

This system has its advantages, but it also has its drawbacks. Some of the humanity behind the process was definitely lost in the golden era of the credit score. Independent contractors and self-employed people always found themselves at a disadvantage. Bankers trusted $50,000 on a W-2 more than a $100,000 income shown on personal bank statements. If you were just starting a business, forget it. The systems simply did not have the flexibility or the sophistication to understand that a person could be responsible enough to leave corporate America and buy a house at the same time.

That kind of real estate process just won’t fly in today’s world, especially not one that has been completely rebalanced by COVID. The Bureau of Labor reports that more than 40% of the U.S. workforce is in the gig economy. They control $1 trillion worth of income. Moreover, the majority of Americans in traditional jobs want to move into the 1099 lifestyle. When it’s time to buy a house, you need a financial institution that understands where the world is going.

A Cultural Rebalancing

In my search to find a modern way to buy properties, I ran across Morty. Morty finally brings the digital home buying process full circle — providing users with fast, automated comparison searches that are tailored specifically to the individual.

Morty takes you through the entire process of getting a mortgage, from the preapproval letter to the terms of the loan. You get accurate loan options in seconds without having to give your personally identifying information out countless times. Your reports are fully transparent, giving you line by line breakdowns of your options without having to worry about hidden fees.

With Morty, we’ve finally moved beyond having your credit score punished just because you want to explore the home buying market. You can start the process without a hard credit pull, saving you the hassle of explaining to bankers why you did not meet the computer’s minimum limits.

Most importantly, you skip the nonsense teaser rates and get straight to the real numbers. Imagine — a real estate agent that treats you like you’re smart instead of trying to fool you into a multi hundred thousand dollar purchase with a week of 0% APR!

A more efficient, humanized process means that you can close in 3 weeks with minimal stress instead of waiting in line for months and exploring dead end after dead end. If you are looking for the technology that finally gets the home buying process right, give Morty a try.