SANTA ANA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Veros Real Estate Solutions (Veros), an award-winning industry leader in enterprise risk management, collateral valuation services and predictive analytics, has released VeroFORECASTSM predictions for the 12 months ending March 1, 2019 that project residential market values continuing to appreciate at an overall national average of +4.3%. That rate is a tenth of a percent increase over predictions made in Q4 2017, and more than a half-percent above predictions made a year ago.
Each quarter, Veros releases a completely new VeroFORECAST report predicting national real estate market trends for the next 12-month period. The report released today, which covers March 1, 2018 through March 1, 2019, reports data from 985 counties, 342 metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs), and 13,638 zip codes that cover 82% of the U.S. population.
“Our latest report predicts the overall U.S. residential real estate market will continue to rise, and rise at a slightly higher rate,” said Eric Fox, VP of Statistical and Economic Modeling at Veros. "This is the 23rd quarter in a row where this index has forecast appreciation and the 97% to 3% split between appreciating and depreciating metro areas over the next 12 months remains unchanged from the last update, suggesting consistency in nearly every metro market."
DENVER CRACKS TOP 5 MARKETS
Each VeroFORECAST lists the top ten and bottom ten trending markets of the roughly 340 analyzed. This report's top ten is once again dominated by MSAs in Washington State. However, Colorado's most populated MSA has cracked the top five, ending the Evergreen State's unprecedented control of the entire top five in last quarter's predictions. The projected top five appreciating MSAs are:
| 1 | Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, Washington | 11.1% | ||||
| 2 | Bellingham, Washington | 10.1% | ||||
| 3 | Kennewick-Pasco-Richland, Washington | 10.0% | ||||
| 4 | Denver-Aurora-Broomfield, Colorado | 9.9% | ||||
| 5 | Mount Vernon-Anacortes, Washington | 9.9% | ||||
"The Seattle market remains exceedingly strong due to its extremely low supply of homes, which is at just one month inventory, and a population that grew 22% over the last 15 years," Fox said. "Its unemployment rate of 4.5% is slightly higher than the national rate of 4.1%. In Denver, however, where inventory is only slightly better at around 1.4 months, the unemployment rate is an extremely low 2.9% amid rapid population growth."
"I’m not surprised to see that four of the five fastest appreciating markets are in Washington State," said Economist Matthew Gardner, with Seattle-based Windermere Real Estate. "Seattle, in particular, continues to be a popular choice for residents coming from more expensive markets in California. In Seattle and the other Washington State metro areas that made this list, the supply of new construction homes is very limited, which puts additional pressure on existing home prices. I don’t expect much to change in 2018; competition for homes will remain strong, resulting in strong sales and rising home prices."
Anthony Rael, a Denver-based broker with RE/MAX Alliance, added, "The greater Denver real estate market continues its fifth consecutive year of near double-digit appreciation. In fact, the average detached single-family home price just topped the half-million dollar mark for the first time on record and is being fueled by an insatiable demand for $1 million-plus luxury homes that continues to set records each quarter."
Rounding out the projected top 10 markets are Midland, Texas (with 9.5%), Bremerton-Silverdale, Washington (9.5%), Vallejo-Fairfield, California (9.4%), Eugene-Springfield, Oregon (9.1%), and Reno-Sparks, Nevada (9.0%).
Housing supply and population growth are key indicators that go into the VeroFORECAST projections, with very low inventory pushing price increases significantly and slow population growth or declines contributing to low demand in declining areas. Fox said that the average population of the top 25 metros is 950,000 and 300,000 in the bottom 25 metros.
MARKETS PROJECTED TO DEPRECIATE
All but two of the top 25 markets are west of the Mississippi River, with 18 of the bottom 25 markets are east of the Mississippi.
"Many of the markets in the bottom five are in very slow growth metros," Fox said.
The five MSAs projected to have the highest depreciation over the next 12 months, between just over a half-percent and just under three percent, are:
| 1 | Atlantic City-Hammonton, New Jersey | -2.9% | ||||
| 2 | Joplin, Missouri | -1.4% | ||||
| 3 | Goldsboro, North Carolina | -1.1% | ||||
| 4 | Longview, Texas | -0.8% | ||||
| 5 | Peoria, Illinois | -0.6% | ||||
The remaining metro areas in the bottom 10 range from about a predicted half-percent drop to no projected change through March 1, 2019: Trenton-Ewing, New Jersey (-0.6%); Springfield, Illinois (-0.5%); Vineland-Millville-Bridgeton, New Jersey (-0.5%); St. Joseph, Missouri/Kansas (-0.1%); and Huntington-Ashland, West Virginia/Kentucky/Ohio (0.0%).
"Atlantic City demand remains so low because the population has been declining for decades," he said. "Unemployment is high at 6.4%, a full two-and-a-half percentage points above the national average. Supply is around nine months and continues to rise. Peoria's sluggish forecast is due to relatively flat population growth over the past decade and an unemployment rate of 4.6%."
Real estate and mortgage professionals and those in the financial services sector who wish to receive either the complete quarterly reports or regional reports as they are released can subscribe. For more information, email communications@veros.com or call 714.415.6300, option 6.
Additional forecasts and infographics for U.S. markets are available to the press for download and upon request. Visit Veros.com for the full VeroFORECAST report.
About Veros Real Estate Solutions
Veros Real Estate Solutions, a proven leader in enterprise risk management and collateral valuation services, uniquely combines the power of predictive technology, data analytics and industry expertise to deliver advanced automated decisioning solutions. Veros products and services are optimizing millions of profitable decisions throughout the mortgage industry, from loan origination through servicing and securitization. Veros provides solutions to control risk and increase profits including automated valuations (AVMs), fraud and risk detection, portfolio analysis, forecasting, and next-generation collateral risk management platforms. Veros is headquartered in Santa Ana, Calif. For more information, please visit www.veros.com or call (866) 458-3767.
About Eric Fox, VP of Statistical and Economic Modeling
Eric Fox received his M.S. in Statistics and B.S. in Mathematics and Economics from Purdue University, and has 30 years of industrial experience in statistical and econometric modeling, probabilistic life methodology development, statistical training, probabilistic design software development, and probabilistic financial/competitive analysis. Fox has published more than 20 technical papers on probabilistic and statistical methods.
