SACRAMENTO - The Sacramento real estate market is hot. A recent report from Zillow predicts a 2.5 percent increase in home prices in the Sacramento region through June 2013.
Tim Collom, a realtor with Dunnigan Realtors, has seen his home sale numbers skyrocket, up 25% since last year. By this time last summer, Collom had sold 15 homes and so far this year he's sold 22 homes.
And it's not just the volume of sellers and buyers. Collom says inventory is moving quickly, "In East Sacramento, we're seeing a lot of buyers out there. Basically we had three offers, it was listed at $290 thousand and it went for $8 thousand over the asking price," says Collom about a basic three bedroom, one bathroom house that sold in a week.
Mortgage brokers are also seeing big business. Jim Reed, a lender with Summit Funding, has seen his business go up 60 percent since last summer. In July 2011, Summit lent $60 million and this July, Summit has lent $96 million.
Reed says the reasons for the rise are three-fold: "first, rates are at an all time low, the second one is the housing market is back as you can see from appreciation, and the third one is there's some government assistance for people who are under water to help them re-finance and take advantage of today's rates."
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