U.S. mortgage rates fell to a 2½-year low this week, and Opendoor, a national real estate company that buys homes for resale, foresees strong home sales activity in Las Vegas for the rest of 2019.
The Mortgage Bankers Association reported that the average rate on a 30-year fixed mortgage — the most popular for home purchases — fell to 4.01 percent for the week ending Aug. 2, from 4.08 percent the previous week. It is the lowest level since November 2016.
Opendoor’s Las Vegas General Manager Alice Ferguson suggested the lower rates will most likely stoke sales in Southern Nevada.
“We saw mortgage rates drop last December, which immediately drove demand in real estate activity in Las Vegas,” Ferguson said. “With this most recent drop in rates, we’ll likely see a healthy level of activity as we go into Q3 and Q4. This should lengthen what is traditionally the hottest real estate season (May-August) with a healthy level of available inventory compared to last year.”
In Southern Nevada, home sales have slowed a bit, but prices have risen compared to a year ago. The Greater Las Vegas Association of Realtors reports that homebuyers bought 3,159 previously owned single-family houses in July, down 0.8 percent from a year earlier. The median sales price of those July sales was $303,000, up 4.5 percent from a year earlier.
Opendoor has been in Las Vegas since 2016 and uses software, including a smartphone app and market data to buy and sell homes all across the city.
Opendoor’s Western U.S. markets include Las Vegas, Phoenix, Tucson, Portland, Sacramento, Los Angeles and Riverside.
Since the company’s launch in 2014, Opendoor has served more than 50,000 customers in 20 U.S. cities.
