What was expected to be a real estate slump due to the pandemic – turned out to be a record year for the Wasatch Back.
When the pandemic hit the Wasatch Back last March, nearly everything shut down. At the time, the local real estate market saw a slight dip but that was short lived. By mid-June the market had fully recovered and by the end of 2020, it ad set records across the board for sales totals and median prices.
Park City Board of Realtors President Mark Jacobsen says as people starting to work from home – they realized home could be anywhere...
“Well, we’ve had a lot of people come from all over the country coming to Park City,” Jacobsen said. “I think part of it has to do with some of the news reports that we've been in, but basically on Fox News. And there was a couple of articles that were written that all the mountain resorts were where people were headed, because they could work remote. After that, we’ve been selling a lot of property.”
Real estate agents found they could do in person open houses and the pent up demand from the isolation of March and April saw buyers return. Pending contracts outstripped new listings and competition for a limited number of units was fierce.
“In Park City itself and single family homes over 2019, we’re up 64%,” he said. Our sales volume is up 83%. And our median price is up 26%. That's in Park City proper. Snyderville Basin is similar, they're 42% up for the quantity sold for single family. The volume is up 84%. And that's a 23% change in median price.”
Record low inventories were recorded in August and the numbers he says continued downward through the end of the year.
“We generally have between 2000 and 2500 listings. Right now, we're sitting around 850. So, our inventory is continuing to be short,” Jacobsen said.
With fewer homes available and more buyers wanting them, the rise in sales prices was inevitable. According to the quarterly market report ending Dec. 31st – the median price for a single family homes rose 25% to $2.5 million. Park Meadows and the Heber Valley saw the biggest increase in median prices – both up 36%. In Old Town, the median sales price went up 11%, and in the Snyderville Basin the median price went up 23%
With new projects coming online, Jacobsen is optimistic for another good year in 2021 – with some leveling out in prices.
“I think with all the projects that are moving along that will we'll have some inventory, we're seeing a little bit of slowing that, you know, not terribly, it's starting to flatten out just a little bit,” Jacobsen said. “But I mean, I was looking at the numbers yesterday, and we had 34 new listings and 6200 contracts. So, we're still almost doubling our numbers of what we have coming on the market. We are seeing some pushback scenarios. We have seen some price reductions. So, it's not just whatever you want to put it up for it's going to go.”
