Rents are on the rise – how to create more home buyers

Rents are going up. Interest rates are still low. What a perfect combination to create more home buyers.

But, with every silver lining sometimes there is sort of a cloud. And ironically, it’s the “cloud” which can help real estate brokers and agents in this situation.

The cloud we are talking about is a massive neighborhood and MLS database combined with a real estate search tool that real estate pros can embed into their site.

There is no need to gather all the hyper-local  data yourself. There is no need to store all that data on your website. There is no need to manage that huge amount of data on your website. There’s a service that takes care of all that work.

But back to the gift of higher rents.

Right now, experts are showing that rents are increasing by about 5% per year.  Not bad. Unless you live in San Francisco or other CA cities. The increase in San Francisco 15.6%, San Diego 11.3%, Oakland – 10.8%. Also, not so good in Denver – 10.6% and Atlanta – 8.8%.

The actual dollar amounts they are getting for rent is downright scary. In San Francisco its $3550, New York City – $3500, Oakland – $2450, Miami – $2400 and Boston – $2350.

Certainly a sign that rental inventory is getting tight.

Fortunately, more residential apartment units are on the drawing board to be built. Those projects are at a 15-year high. But it will take some time to build those units.

Conversely, mortgage rates are still incredibly low. Seems like a perfect opportunity to turn these renters into home buyers.

But these home buyers are a little bit different than buyers of old. These potential buyers are mainly millenials.

This generation will be 75% of the workforce by 2025. Born between 1980 and 2000, they already make up 40% of the workforce and continually move up the ranks in income.

But remember, this is the wired generation. Their iPhones are just about a permanent part of their bodies (something you know is going to happen real soon. The Apple Watch brings them one step closer).

They want access to data right away. While they are walking down the street. As soon as they walk into their apartment.

Some real estate deals are based on relationships. Same with millenials. But there needs to be a tech edge to any marketing because everything this generation does has a tech edge.

When a real estate agent or broker adds the SpatialMatch real estate search tool and hyper-local database, they add a massive tech element to their brand.

On their website, agents are able to show millenials not only homes for sales, but where those homes are located spatially on a map.

So they can show buyers all the key benefits of the location – proximity to highways, schools, airports, etc.

The second thing that will be appealing to millenials is the urban scene. Because that’s where they want to be. Millenials prefer the cities for a few reasons. One, is because that’s where the jobs are located. This is the generation that went through the Great Recession. They want decent jobs.

Secondly, the millenials are tired of the suburbs. They want the excitement and amenities of a larger city.

But as you can see from the rents (and imagine the condo prices in the cities!), living NEAR a city will have  major appeal.

With SpatialMatch’s massive database and geo-capabilities, you can also show all the cool urban-like amenities – clubs, gourmet restaurants, funky coffee houses, yoga studios, fun gyms. Just about the same as living in the city but certainly, certainly must less expensive to live there.

The third element is if you impress these home buyers, they can easily become social proof for you to get more of these buyers. A few mentions to their Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn friends and you’re in.

And this time, there’s no landlord. They are the owners. That’s certainly appealing as well.

With rents going up, there’s a big window opening up for brokers and agents, just like one of those window displays you see in the big cities at places like Macy’s and Saks. But to get young people to look in your window, you need to have all the goodies that will catch their attention. SpatialMatch will go a long way to providing that window appeal.

To embed the powerful hyper-local data widget SpatialMatch on your site, click here.

For an article on rising rents and the millenials, go here.

Bars in Fort Collins on the SpatialMatch hyper-local search platform