Las Vegas Real Estate Market Update
We have entered The Twilight Zone of real estate in Las Vegas. There is very little inventory and yet there are no offers on what’s available. All the entry level homes that most of my subscribers look for are not available for purchase. The remaining bling bling properties (larger homes with pools and features) are out of reach for most home buyers and they make terrible investments.
Las Vegas Realtors reported 3,524 single-family homes listed for sale without any sort of offer in July, a 4.2 percent drop from June but a 51.9 percent drop from the same time last year.
A study Florida Atlantic University’s College of Business by proves Las Vegas is ranked #6 in the list of overpriced homes.
“We are in the grocery store where everyone wants apples but there are none for sale. There are plenty of oranges but few can afford them. Folks who can afford oranges don’t want to buy oranges because they don’t like the way they taste.”
How does this happen? This is stuff that’s not hitting the main stream media:
- Forbearance – You mean that’s still happening? Yes. All those investors and home owners who are struggling with mortgages are still being carried by the government. Strangely, this has not made the news. The FHA is offering a free ride until the end of 2024.
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Employee Retention Credit – The government is still throwing money at small business owners. “You still have time!” – I get one of these calls every day from some telemarketer telling me there is free money to be had. This free money is supporting small business owners who own real estate. Will the government keep handing out free candy? Probably. What’s stopping them from printing another 20 trillion dollars?
- Institutional Investors – There are a dozens of privately held hedge funds and Wall Street investors who own tens of thousands of these smaller homes. According to CNN, they own a large segment of the entry level homes investors are looking for. No one knows for sure if these institutions are profitable or just massive pyramid scheme. That inventory may never come on the market. Since these are not on the market for sale, they are only available for rent. This explains why the rental market is tanking (see article below).
This isn’t just research by the way. I had an investor who attempted to purchase this 3 bed, 1 bath, no garage home in a really rough neighborhood. It was on the market at $200k and someone paid $210k cash. It needed at least $40k in repair (video). Whoever bought that would be lucky to squeak out a 5% return.
In summary, there is nothing worth buying for the small investor in the foreseeable future.
Rents Still Declining
Avg. Rent | Annual |
Studio – $874 | -1% |
1 Bed – $1,340 | -8% |
2 Beds – $1,462 | -11% |
We are also past the rental season. Anyone who has a property vacant now is going to feel even more pain as we approach the holidays. A strategy we have been offering our clients is to get very aggressive on pricing but only offer a 10 month lease so we can adjust the terms during peak rental season.
It will probably get worse as owners cut prices to attract tenants. In the meantime, there are a LOT of multi units coming down the pipe. This page lists all the thousands of units that will be constructed.
Floods
Yep. We had that. 5 of our properties had either roof leaks or were damaged by improper drainage. 2 of our properties required remediation. Here are a couple of videos of what we do for these:
In summary, the procedure involves removing 10 – 14″ of drywall, treating the 2x4s and letting it dry out before we put it back together. Lots of work.
Quick snapshot of our staff.
We have more folks to help manage our properties now. Vennetta and Victoria will be managing some of our portfolio. Our goal is to provide even better customer service than before. Recent customer reviews on Yelp and Google have been excellent!
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