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It's an Old Joke...

Reminded of a line my dad used to say about the price of houses

It is absolutely no joke that the price of houses is up these days.  But every time we talk about it, I remember that it was a standing joke with my Dad.  If you came up to him and said "What's up?", at least half the time he would say "the price of houses".

During the pandemic of 2020 (and following) the construction industry was in the news because the price of lumber and many other building materials skyrocketed.  When combined with the desire for people to live more "separately" for fear of communicable diseases - thus seeking more spaces - the price of housing shot up quickly and sharply.

4 years past the onset of the Covid pandemic, we still see housing affordability as a big, societal issue.  The bottom line is that we need to build more housing of every type.  When some folks are considering the possible purchase of a new custom home, they wonder "is now a good time to buy, or will the price drop if I wait a while?"

I can tell you from my 25 years in the business, that in  the Quincy, IL market the price of a new home has never, or almost never been lower than it was in a previous year.  The house built in 1999 cost more than the one built in 1998.  The house built in 2009 still cost more than the one built in 2008 - no matter that we were rolling through the Great Recession.  The house built in 2024 costs more than the one built in 2023, whether or not lumber or another commodity is up or down, the cost to build a new home is virtually never cheaper in the future than it is today.

One big difference in a monthly payment actually doesn't have anything to do with the cost of the sticks and bricks to build a home.  That is the mortgage rate for all who are financing their purchase.  Certainly the payment is cheaper for a $510,000 house at 6% than it is for a $500,000 house at 8%.  So it may make sense to speak with your lender and pay attention to the cost of money.  Many of the other physical components of the home go up in price annually, with increases from vendors.  Most people in the industry would like a raise in pay annually.  For these and other reasons, the price never seems to dip.

So if you are on the sidelines, not designing your dream home in hopes that the price will drop in the future...let me say that you may be missing an opportunity to buy today at the lowest price it will ever be again.  And that's no joke!

Thanks for reading, 

Scott Koontz