Here are the highlights of Fairfield County’s housing market in 2022.
2022 is a wrap! Today I want to give you my take on what was a really memorable year in real estate. The spring market last year was so difficult for buyers. You got to tour a house for 15 minutes and then had to decide how much over asking price you had to bid—just a little bit over asking wasn’t going to do it.
You had to waive contingencies, like an appraisal, mortgage, and sometimes even the inspection contingency. If you miraculously managed to beat out the 24 other bidders, excitement quickly turned to panic and doubt. You start to realize you may have gotten caught up in the bidding frenzy and don’t even love the property. It was such a rush that many buyers backed out of transactions.
Fortunately, the market slowed considerably in the second half of the year. That was driven by a combination of mortgage rates rising and what I like to call buyer fatigue. Buyers were fed up with all the bidding wars and decided to just enjoy a post-COVID summer.
In spite of the market shift, Fairfield County finished 2022 on a very strong note. The average selling price across the county was 2.6% over asking, and the average price increase across the county was 5% over 2021. Meanwhile, towns like Norwalk, Wilton Weston, and Fairfield had price increases ranging from 8% to 11% over asking. Westport came in at an astounding 29% over 2021. These higher prices were caused by the lack of listing inventory. The number of sales last year was down 23% over 2021, and new listings were down by 21%.
There is no sign of a housing crash here. If you’d like to talk about the real estate market of your town in more detail, just call or email me. I’m always here to help!
