If this January is any indication, the seasons are shifting in Boston area real estate. Usually between December 15 and January 15, no one is contacting us about buying a house. This year, prospective clients started calling and writing right after Christmas.

Winter buyers: Some clients were looking to get on the road, heeding my advice about the advantages of winter buying. Frankly, they are a bit late. Our agents were ready; leftover shopping is in progress.

Spring buyers: Others were preparing early for the spring market. What is remarkable is that the spring buyers are a few weeks to a month or more early, compared to previous years. Generally, the spring buyer calls happen in February. It makes me wonder why we are seeing an early trend this year. It makes me hopeful.

Winter shopping:

Winter house hunting is good for finding the leftover property that was mismarketed in during the fall, or even the spring and fall, markets. Some of these have significant reductions from an unrealistic asking price. In 2022, it is hard to imagine that any price was unrealistic, but there were some!

There are some years when I was winter shopping with my clients. Some years, November, December and January were great times to get properties that were still for sale during the lower-demand time. Other winters, there was really nothing to see on a weekend.

The key to winter shopping success to is to make a negotiation plan as soon as you are confident. Our clients — and sometimes our agents — find it hard to believe that a property has been sitting on the market for months, just to have it go off the market as soon as our client is ready to make an offer. Sometimes the competition is real (another winter house hunter); sometimes the property is still sitting there two weeks later, and we uncovered a liar.

Spring shopping:

Spring buyers trade more choice for more competition. In the last two years, competition has been off-the-charts hard on buyers. This year still looks to be better for buyers than the last two. But, it is still not looking to be a buyer’s market anytime soon. We have a regional housing shortage.

Why would the seasons shift:

Climate:

Winters are getting warmer in New England.  Here’s more of the data about this change. That change might be letting would-be buyers imagine house hunting on a 38-degree Sunday where they would not on a 15-degree Sunday. Maybe…

Boston has a reputation for being snowy that it may no longer deserve. Climate change is also causing more snow in areas outside of New England. Looking at snowfall statistics, Boston gets 52.7 inches a year. That’s based on a ten-year average that includes the heavy snow of 2015. Sellers tend not to list their property until the snow is gone.

Showing a house in the snow has a number of problems for the seller; namely people falling, people making a mess in the house from snow melt, and wasted heating fuel. If more sellers are putting houses on the market, or keeping them on the market, the better for our clients.

Preparedness:

With the awful seller-favoring markets of the past two years, would-be buyers are accepting our message that a prepared buyer prevails. Generally, we can get a would-be buyer familiar with what to expect from their particular market. It takes seeing 4-6 houses with one of our agents. Then they are used to what information they will have,  and what information they won’t have. Knowing what is typical helps a buyer decide whether to offer and how much, based on an idea of fair market value and the competition on this house.  Are people calling early because they want to be prepared? Maybe… I hope so.