It's a Desert - The Greater Atlanta Housing Supply Remains Scant

It's Spring of '21 and there's no relief in sight for the shortage of housing inventory around the greater Atlanta area. The usual first quarter bump was virtually non-existent for 2021, instead the deserted landscape continues to have buyers frustrated and sellers delighted. We continue to look at year over year (by month) key indicators for 16 major markets around north Atlanta. We've examined them in terms of the number of homes for sale and also tracked steadily increasing home prices, (both pages continuously updated). Below we look at the current data in terms of "months of inventory". Months of inventory reflects an estimate of the amount of time it would take to sell all of the current listings in a given area if no new listings became available. A balanced market is 3-6 months; 0-3 is a seller's market (more buyers than homes) and 6+ is a buyers market (more homes than buyers). 11 of the 16 markets below are at 1 month of supply or under; 5 are between 1 and 2 months of supply. The "Atlanta" market sits at just over 2 and the entire FMLS region at just over 1 month. These numbers have never been this low.

North Fulton - 400 Corridor

South Cherokee County & Cumming

Marietta & West Cobb County 

Sandy Springs & Close in OTP/ITP

Atlanta & "Greater Atlanta" as Designated by FMLS

The situation isn't likely to improve any time soon. The pandemic resulted in a significant increase in home updates like pools, basement finishing, remodels and more. Many owners pulled cash out and refinanced at historically low rates; why move now? New construction continues to lag and what's out there offers much less for much more. Some builders no longer price a home until foundations are in; hoping to avoid price increases of materials. What's a buyer to do? FOCUS and don't fall in love.

Don't be the buyer that loses by winning; many sellers will never break even when it's time to sell. The motivations for every buyer are different but record low inventory, low rates and a huge buyer pool is a bad recipe for many buyers.

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• housing supply (1)
• months of inventory (1)