Inflection Point? About face?.....Pivot?: Bend real estate market

             At the halfway point of calendar year 2025, and midway of Trump’s first year in office there appears to be no clearcut consensus as to direction of the economy or the various sectors such as real estate that it comprises.
            There is one widely accepted fact, however. TACO Don’s wild tariff swings are leaving a wake of uncertainty. The starts and stops are impeding investments in manufacturing, services and retail businesses, even though the stock market has rebounded from Trump’s tariff “Liberation Day” performance.
          Wall Street, or the investor class, now appears to have written off tariff worries--for now. But there’s still considerable concern on Main Street, which drives the economy with retail and services purchasing power. The upshot-- a nervous wait and see attitude.
        Barring an untenable spike in already high interest rates, will the great American dream of home ownership be more attractive as a refuge – a scramble to tangible asset safety? There’s no clear consensus.
        Pivotal to real estate is the direction of interest rates, against the backdrop of continuing tension between Trump and the Federal Reserve – specifically Chairman Jerome Powell, whose term expires under a year from now.
        In his trademark social media carping, Trump has been insulting and goading Powell to reduce interest rates. But the Fed chairman and the board majority prefer to hold the course given the potential effects of tariffs and other Trump policies to push inflation higher.
        Real estate markets, especially residential, have been struggling in many areas of the country. A Redfin report notes that 15% of national home sales contracts have failed. Central Oregon real estate has previously bucked national trends. But the region thus far has not been able to build itself out of high prices that challenge a large portion of the workforce to enter the housing market.
            One sign of a possible shift has emerged in Bend, by far the largest market segment in the region. From a marginally favorable sellers market for the past few months there are signs of a slight edge toward favoring potential buyers.
            But the caveat is whether any slight change – absent more favorable interest rates and a coherent administration tariff policy-- will benefit either buyers and sellers.
            In Bend, the largest regional submarket, the median price of a single family home on less than an acre was $724,500 for the 12 month period ending June 30. That was 1.90% lower than the $738,500 recorded over the previous 12 months of mid 2023 through mid-2024.
            Through June of this year the monthly median hit a high of $832,000 in April and a low of $700,000 in November and  December of 2024, and February this year.
            Of note, more than 24.66% of the total 1,610 sales for the 12 months closed at more than $1 million, including 84 at more than $1.8 million. Only 94 homes sold at less than $500,000.

            As outlined in the July Beacon Report by Beacon Appraisal Group, there was nearly five months inventory of homes available for sale, as calculated by averaging the previous 12 month sales compared to homes currently listed. That was the same as June and has risen from a low of 2.5 months in November and December of 2024.
            That level of homes listed in relation to past sales puts Bend on the edge, or by some interpretations, of  a shift from a sellers to buyers market. However, consistently high prices along with buyer and seller hesitancy given economic uncertainty could keep the market in more of a static situation than revealing a trending direction.
            In Redmond, the second largest regional market segment, the  rolling 12-month median price of a single family home on less than an acre was $518,500 or 1.57% higher than the $510,500 for the previous comparable period. Redmond inventory was lower than Bend, at three months, with 693 sales during the period and 166 listings at the end of June.
            There were only two sales at more than $1 million, with most clustered in the $400,000 to $600,000 range.
            Together, Bend and Redmond account for about 75% of all single family home sales on less than an acre in the seven submarkets tracked by the Beacon Report with data from the regional multiple listing service.
            Of the five other submarkets, Sisters and Sunriver held positions as the highest median priced areas of Central Oregon, with Sisters recording a median of $739,000 in June and Sunriver $897,000. Note that Sisters and Sunriver include Black Butte Ranch and Sunriver Resort, respectively.
            Median prices for June in the other three submarkets ranged from $360,000 in Jefferson County (Madras); $394,000 in LaPine and $417,000, Crook County (including Prineville).

Some indicators of a changing market

 Hints of an evolving market can be noted in anecdotal and on the street observation.
Open houses, once an oddity of the blistering Covid era market, now dot the Bend weekend landscape. 
            For Sale signs also remain in front of homes after the listings are no longer active on the multiple listing service, providing brokers an opportunity to reset the date for the number of days the home has been on the market. That also leaves the listing broker with an opportunity to interest a potential drive-by  buyer.
            Builders are also stepping up to energize sales. Some are offering interest rate “buydowns” and also credits for “upgrades” that would add thousands of dollars to the listing price.
            “We’re tired of these rates, and we know you are too. So we decided to take it down a notch!,” reads a recent email from a large Bend builder.
            The term “Price Reductions” on listing flyers and email blasts is now obsolete, in favor of more euphemistic terms like “New Price,” “Revised Price” or “Price Adjustment.”

 Multi-family housing:: Struggling From Oversupply

 Another indication of softening of the real estate environment is a glut of vacant apartments in Bend, coupled with more new ones flowing through the construction pipeline.
            A report by a leading Bend commercial brokerage estimated earlier this year that as many as 1,000 Bend and Redmond apartments were vacant, noting that another 1,000 were expected to come to market in the near future.

Facebook ads increase

            The City of Bend has aggressively pushed new multi-family developments, initially offering substantial tax breaks to a couple of projects south of the downtown area. The city then backtracked on breaks for subsequent projects, shifting to a tax increment financing strategy, rather than upfront break, to encourage building in the urban core.
             A major Los Angeles based developer has backed off plans to begin consruction of a 1,600 unit project, citing interest rates, high construction costs and a generally unfavorable multi-family market.
            The aggressive push for more apartments has run up against the reality of rents that have yet to adjust significantly to reflect area incomes. Vacancies in newer more upscale buildings have prompted incentives such as free months rent. And colorful balloons float above tent signs encouraging potential renters to take a tour.
            In single family neighborhoods rental signs that were largely absent only a few years ago now languish in front yards for weeks. One factor could be that single family home rentals were in demand for transient healthcare workers who enjoyed substantial six-figure incomes during the Covid shutdown.
            For investors in multi-family projects, capitalization rates – as calculated by net income in relation to listing prices – have started to rise. The higher the “cap rate,” the more attractive to a buyer, the lower better for the seller. And investors require cap rates closer to prevailing interest rates.
            Local commercial brokers say there may be a tipping point wherein apartment owners decide that more substantial resets of rental rates make more sense than leaving units vacant. Again, interest rates are a factor, especially for newer projects still carrying higher rates of recent years with possible balloon payments coming due and refinancing providing little cash flow relief.
            A turnaround in the multi-family market may have to wait until overall direction of the economy is more clear, allowing for loosening of interest rates and giving renters and their employers more confidence in the future.

Housing: A Macro View from Axois

     As reported by Axios, the national housing picture is exhibiting clouds on the horizon. Updated on February 19, 2025

Talk about a head fake. After a surge in homebuilding in the final weeks of 2024, new data today shows a sharp pullback in activity.

Why it matters: Few sectors capture the story of the economy in recent years better than housing — Americans' frustration with high prices, elevated borrowing costs, CEO uncertainty, and a supply-demand mismatch (for goods and workers).

• Two new economic factors could be added to that list of long-running housing issues: President Trump's trade war and deportation policies.

"[U]ncertainty over the scale and scope of tariffs has builders further concerned about costs," Robert Dietz, chief economist at the National Association of Homebuilders, said Tuesday alongside an index that showed dampened industry sentiment.

The intrigue: High housing costs — made worse by an upswing in mortgage rates — are keeping some would-be buyers sidelined. Trump's policies could have more inflationary consequences than not.

• Homebuilders rely heavily on immigrant workers, who could be difficult to find with a crackdown on immigration (though at least one top Fed official has pointed to immigration contributing to higher rents).

2024 down; 2025 Ahead - Major changes or more of the same? Too many unkowns

             Now that 2024 is in the rear view mirror, along with the presidential election, are there any emerging clues to the 2025 real estate market direction?
            To hear newly-installed Trump tell it he’s going to take care of one critical variable – interest rates.
            “I’ll demand that interest rates drop immediately,” Trump said. “And likewise, they should be dropping all over the world. Interest rates should follow us all over.” Trump blustered in a virtual appearance before the the World Economic Forum, often jusst shortened to “Davos,” for the cognoscenti of the financial world.
            Well now, that taken care of, everything should be hunky dory in real estate. He’s president and  never lies, dissembles or breaks a promise. Let’s keep an eye on eggs, which Trump touted before the election would be less costly along with prices of other consumer goods. 
            As  Elon Musk, often called Trump’s “First Buddy,”shakes things up in the federal sphere, one of the more curious new presidential edicts, euphemistically known as executive orders, is to force federal remote workers back to the office. This could mesh with another strategy to sell much of federal office space. Fewer employees left after firings and resignations would mean less needed office space, and what is left would be made unattractive to returnees.
            Maybe interest rates will fall along with the price of eggs as the bird flu abates. Maybe the idea of a “sovereign wealth fund” Trump has floated will be a reality, funded by all that surplus oil revenue from ramped up “drill baby drill.”  But how does that work to reduce the the country’s current budget deficit? One possibility mentioned is to issue more debt to “fund the fund” so to speak.
            Hmmm. Reduce the deficit by borrowing to invest and build sovereign wealth? What could go wrong?
           Let's pivot from Trumpisms, albeit realizing that  the chaos created thus far by the new administration will nevertheless hang over the economy in some way at least in these early days and weeks, and likely much longer.  

The Year Past 

            Looking back at 2024 in Bend real estate maybe the most salient observation could be the lack of any well-defined trend. Inventory of single family homes for sale remained tight, prices remained high relative to local median incomes and total sales stayed about the same as the previous 12 months.

            All this, according to the Market Action Index of First American Title Co., translated to “stasis” and a “slight sellers market,” thanks to continued low numbers of homes for sale as reported in early January.
            That assessment could easily be translated to “nothing new to see here,” in that virtually the same language had been used in nearly all of the title company’s weekly reports for 2024.
            The final Q4 2024 Beacon Report by Beacon Appraisal Group shows the the rolling 12- month median price of Bend single family homes on less than an acre was $710,000, a 3.0% drop from the $732,500 for the previous 12 months of 2023.
            The median monthly price hit a hgh of $800,000 in October and the low point in February, at $682,000.
            There were at total of 1,582 sales during the 12 months, a slight uptick of 17 closings compared to 2023, with an inventory of 2.5 months as calculated using the 319 active listings at the end of December and dividing inventory by the average monthly sales in 2024.
            In Redmond, Central Oregon’s second largest market segment, median prices for the 12 months rose by $23,000 to $509,000 from $486,000 at the end of 2023, a slight bump of 4.73%.
            Redmond sales also rose by 16%, or by 114 additional sales in 2024 from the 598 in 2023. Inventory there was also tighter than in Bend, at only a 2.0 months supply.

Affordability Remains an Issue

            Moving into the new year, the quest continues to find  strategies that will that will enable families with the Bend median household income of slightly under $89,000 to obtain affordable housing. At the median income level, with an optimistic 6% interest rate, a healthy 30% down payment, and modest $550 monthly debts a family could afford a home priced at $447,000.

            According to the Beacon Report, only 78 homes out of the total 1,582 homes sold in Bend during 2024 were priced from $400,000 to $500,000 – and only five listed in that range at the end of December.
            There is a disconnect between the availability of “affordable” homes for those with median incomes, and the high end of Bend sales  Last year 393 homes, or 24.8%, sold for more than $1 million, and 73 above $1.8 million.
            As has been reported throughout the country, among factors that likely drive higher sales prices are owners with low interest rates, or even no mortgage, who have been in their homes for a considerable time, and others who bought during the early 2000 decade recession. These may be able to roll generous cash margins into other properties – without the onus of having large mortgages at currently elevated interest rates.
            Also part of the affordable equation for the local workforce is the availability of rental inventory.

The Rental Market

In the past few yeas Bend has experienced a substantial increase in multi-family investment and new construction- to the extent that for Q3 2024 one of the region’s oldest, leading commercial brokerages concluded: “Looking ahead the wave of new apartment development will hit the brakes.”

Also in the third quarter of 2024, Compass Commercial’s Navigator market report noted that the region’s slowing population growth had reduced demand, resulting in “stagnated” rental rate growh with increased length of vacancies leading to more landlord concessions.

“Rent rates will likely remain flat, at best, for the next couple years. For property values to rise again, we will need to see both increasing rents and declining interest rates,” the Q3 report for 2024 noted.

That assessment was validated later in 2024 when a Los Angeles based owner delayed planned construction of a massive 1,600 unit mixed use project on former industrial land near the Old Mill District, citing interest rates as a reason.
            Another factor is the city’s pause and reconsideration of offering tax deductions to developers in that area, after two builders had received them and started construction of apartments.
            Now, seemingly a whiplash about face in barely three months, Compass Commercial’s new multi-family report for the final quarter of 2024 cites an assessment of the national real estate site CoStar which paints a much rosier picture.
             “Among apartment markets with inventories under 10,000 units, Bend landed among the top 10 performing markets, a cohort that spanned the Pacific Northwest, Midwest, and Sun Belt regions,” Compass quotes from CoStar.
            If the more recent analysis and predictions for 2025 come to pass, compared to the report only a few months agin, the Bend multi-family market would indeed be a turnaround star.

 

Tourism and Real Estate

        Finally, a look at the Central Oregon tourism sector, which contributes substantially to the local economy in terms of employment in lodging and other service businesses, by some estimates  as well as real estate in the form of vacation home puchases.
             In a presentation to city officials in early January the senior budget and financial analysit for the Community Economic Develoopment Department noted that development fee revenue since 2022 showed, “development is slowing down…the type of development is changing.”
            Reasons, he noted, could be due to, “everything that happened with Covid and the macroeconomic picture with interest rates? Or is that just….a result of Bend hitting a certain size.”
            And every city that hits that certain size then slows down or the development type changes,” according to Roger Serat.
            Amond the dramatic shifts Serat noted were fees for  short term rental permits, which in 2024 according to his research showed a decline from $301,119 in fiscal year 2022 to only $42,561 in 2024.
            One report said that all of Central Oregon, including resorts such as Sunriver,  Black Butte Ranch and Eagle Crest brought in $1.5 billion in related tourism revenue for 2023.
            However, statistics from Visit Bend, the city’s tourism promotion group, have shown lodging room occupancy dropping by 6.5% in July and August of 2024, likely due to wildfire smoke in the region but possibly also the tailing off of post-pandemic travel.
            What’s the bottom line?
            With the background of a chaotic first few weeks of the Trump administration best not to count on anything in real estate – especially as to lower interest rates suddenly creating a boom in sales.
            If tariffs on Canadian building products continue to be an on and off and on again roller coaster expect new construction and housing affordability to be problematic.
            Moreover, if the stock market – a favorite performance metric of Trump– can’t digest economic uncertainty maybe look for real estate sectors to tread water in the near term.