Last week, realtor.com released a survey of active home shoppers (those who plan to purchase their next home in 1 year or less). The survey asked their opinion on an impending recession and its possible impact on the housing market.
Two major takeaways from the survey:
- 42% believe a recession will occur this year or next (another 16% said 2021)
- 59% believe the housing market would fare the same or worse than it did in 2008
Why all the talk about a recession recently?
Over the last year, four separate surveys have been taken asking when we can expect the next recession to occur:
- The Pulsenomics Survey of Market Analysts
- The Wall Street Journal Survey of Economists
- The Duke University Survey of American CFOs
- The National Association of Business Economics
70% of all respondents to the four surveys believe that a recession will occur in 2019 or 2020 with an additional 18% saying 2021.
However, we must realize that a recession does not mean we will experience another housing crash. According to the dictionary definition, a recession is:
“A period of temporary economic decline during which trade and industrial activity are reduced, generally identified by a fall in GDP in two successive quarters.”
During the last recession, a dramatic fall in home values helped cause it.
However, according to research done by CoreLogic, home values weren’t negatively impacted as they were in 2008 during the previous four recessions:
During the four recessions prior to 2008, home values depreciated only once (at a level that was less than 2%). The other three times home values appreciated, twice well above the historic norm of 3.6%.
(Source: Keeping Current Matters)
