Home buyers still have an appetite to relocate to a new area

What began in the early days of the pandemic is still a trend after more than a year-and-a-half: home buyers are expressing a desire to move to a completely new area. This desire is largely due to many workers being permitted to work from home, no longer needing to be tied by proximity to the office. As a result, those looking to buy a new home are searching outside of their current region.

Redfin reports that nearly one in every three users of its website looked to relocate to a different metropolitan area in October. While that’s a slight decrease from the peak of 31.5 percent in early 2021, it remains more than four percent higher than it was prior to the start of the pandemic.

The data was gathered by studying Redfin.com users who viewed at least 10 homes in a particular region and accounted for more than 80 percent of that user’s searches.

Meanwhile, conforming no-point 30-year fixed mortgage rates are averaging 3.0 percent and 15-year rates are near 2.25 percent.

Do you have a question for Real Estate & Mortgage Analyst Mehran Aram? Submit your queries about a home purchase, refinance, or reverse mortgage via Aramco.biz, social media (#AramcoReport), or over the phone at (877) 700-0942 and your questions may be featured in an upcoming article.