I’m here to argue that West Michigan is already fully into an economic recovery. If one were to just listen to national news, I’d be convinced that the world is ending with no clear signal that our economic woes are near an end. Fortunately, our web traffic, local real estate trends and news are all pointing to the fact that West Michigan is coming out of the economic recession before the rest of the country. Let’s check some of the facts.
Fact #1: West Michigan real estate web traffic was up 28% in 2011
When reviewing all the 2011 website traffic from our websites and comparing it to 2010, there was a 28% increase in visitors. We can attribute a chunk of that to enhanced to SEO, but even when taking that into account, the visitors (buyers and sellers) are back!
Fact #2: The Average Listing and Selling Prices Have Climbed Steadily in 2011.
County-by-county we are seeing an increase in both the listing and selling price. We have not seen this since prior to 2007. Not shown in the graphs is that fact that inventory has also been decreasing steadily for the past six months.
Even the National Association of REALTORS® has to agree in a recent magazine article. They point out that the Grand Haven/Holland area showed an average 11.82% increase in home value making it the the second best in the country.
Fact #3: Unemployment Continues to Drop
The Grand Haven Tribune recently posted an article showing that unemployment continued to drop in 14 of the 17 labor markets. All West Michigan areas had a jobless rate drop. More people working mean more buyers and sellers.
Fact #4: The DOW was up 5.5% in 2011.
The DOW was up 640 points or 5.5% in 2011. If you have an evenly distributed stock portfolio, you likely did very well in 2011.
This all points to a very energetic 2012 and that West Michigan is leading the charge. Buyers will see this trend, jump off that fence that they are sitting on and get back into the real estate market. Don’t be a spectator in 2012. Go out and sell! 2012 will prove to be a good time to be a REALTOR®.