Hello Everyone,
What a circus and wild ride this week has been—between tariffs, a roller coaster stock market, and now a 90-day pause. One thing’s for sure: this administration is never boring.
My clients right now span the full spectrum:
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“Let’s pause until the dust settles,”
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“I want to sell before values drop,”
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“This is the best time to buy in years with more inventory!”
I’m not exaggerating—each camp is convinced they’re right, and the media only fuels these perspectives.
📊 San Diego Market Snapshot
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County Inventory: Just crossed 5,500 units—a milestone we haven’t seen in years.
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Downtown Inventory: Over 300 units, also a multi-year high.
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Downtown Sales: Only 15 closings in April, down 53% from April last year.
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Interest Rates: Shot up from 6.50% last week to 7.07% today.
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Average Sale Price: $1,167,090, up 5.42% year-over-year.
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Unit Sales: Down 8.5%, and that number is still trending downward.
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Inventory: Up double digits, giving buyers more choice than they’ve had in a while.
💼 The Industry Faces Another Shift
The real estate world didn’t win any popularity contests last year, thanks to lawsuits over commissions. While commission percentages haven’t changed much, the added friction has affected the client experience.
Now, another wave of contention is coming.
The National Association of Realtors is proposing that sellers can delay putting their homes on the MLS—granting the listing brokerage exclusive marketing and showing rights through “Delayed Marketing Exempt Listings.”
Compass, the largest volume brokerage in the U.S., is leading this effort. They’ve even put up billboards claiming you can only view ~25,000 homes on their website. This creates a push toward “Exclusive and Private Listings.”
⚠️ The Bigger Impact: Less Visibility for Sellers
This shift would block platforms like Zillow, Redfin, and Homes.com from showing those listings, since they rely on MLS feeds.
Zillow already responded: if homes are kept off the MLS, “those homes will never appear on Zillow, ever.”
eXp Realty, the top brokerage by unit volume in the U.S., disagrees with this move, stating it limits exposure and does not serve the seller.
Let’s be clear: limiting your listing to a single brokerage means fewer buyers will see it. Period.
🤔 Why This Matters
Once again, our industry is headed into the spotlight for the wrong reasons. We should be doing what’s best for the client—and that means getting as many eyes on their property as possible.
Exclusivity might sound enticing for brokerages, but for sellers, it means a smaller audience and potentially less money.
Thank You for your continued subscription to our newsletter! We selected our favorite over ten million dollar properties for your review. Please take a look. Hope you have a great weekend!
DID YOU KNOW?
* Equity markets bounced back sharply yesterday as most new tariffs were put on pause for 90 days with a universal 10% tariff except for China. (CNBC)
* The size of the average home for sale in the US declined to 1,800 sq ft in March, down 7% from March 2020. This makes homes more affordable while the cost to build them remains rising. (FT)
* Four investor lessons from this past week:1. Don't bet against good companies.2. Don't expect certainty: expect drama.3. Nobody ever made a dime panicking.4. Bulls make money, bears make money: pigs get slaughtered. (CNBC)
* BUSINESS INSIDER ran a story saying the fight over exclusive home listings could make it harder to find houses on aggregator sites like Homes.com, Zillow, etc and prevent commissions from dropping: might the era of free content sold back to agents be coming to an end?
* The US imports about 25 - 30% of lumber needed for housing from Canada: lumber prices are already up about 16% so far this year. (FT)
* 40% of the $36 trillion US National Debt must soon be refinanced: if yields stay elevated, the risk of a sovereign debt spiral grows. Markets hate uncertainty and fear drives capital into safer assets like treasuries. The roller-coaster tariff-fueled headlines we've witnessed could push investors back into bonds, and as demand for bonds increases, the lower the yields....which could reduce the rates we have to pay for refinancing the US debt..... lots of capital has flowed into Bitcoin and Gold too.
* Americans surpassed Chinese nationals as the largest cohort of overseas buyers in prime central London in the last quarter of 2024.
* 11.1% of active credit card accounts made only minimum payments, up from 10.9% in the 3rd quarter (Philadelphia Fed). The share of accounts 90 days past due also rose to a record. (Bloomberg)
