This time last year there was a real chance I could move to the MD suburbs (or exurbs, really) of DC when I was in search & call.

Here's a thread on what the housing market there is like.

Now that the home we're buying here in BHM has cleared inspections, here's my story. /1 https://twitter.com/graykimbrough/status/1390697486822617093

We began searching almost three months ago, and rapidly realized that the market was turning bonkers. The first home we looked at sold for $23K over list price.

We decided to really pick our spots to avoid putting in a lot of time and thought into a house we had no chance at. /2

After looking at several houses, we find one we want to put an offer on. It was at the very top of our price range, so we could only offer $6K over list.

It went for $21K over list, and we were told the winning offer had an escalation clause for another $25K if necessary. /3

If we couldn't compete at the top of our range because we would have to go that much over, well, our range wasn't what we thought.

The next two offers we put in were on homes that were $60-80K less expensive, but needed more work.

We were beat out on each by cash buyers. /4

As a neighbor of ours (who, like us is both currently renting and hoping to buy) sarcastically said to me, "Who knew everyone in Birmingham happens to have half a mil in cash lying around?"

We offered $16K over list on one of those homes, hoping to beat the cash offers. No dice.

So we decided if we couldn't beat the escalation clauses + we couldn't pay cash, we could at least join the former. We put an escalation clause in our fourth offer, saying we'll pay up to $25K over list--higher than we had ever gone.

Thankfully we didn't have to go that high. /6

All the time pressure, of having to pounce right as a home came on the market, for months on end, got to us. So did having cash buyers still swoop in on homes that didn't sell in the first month.

And it definitely wasn't just us. We saw other families discouraged from buying. /7

Our realtor told us some buyers were waiving inspection--something especially dangerous because Alabama is a buyer beware state, meaning sellers don't have to disclose diddley squat when they sell a home.
With the work needed on some of the homes we saw, it was never an option /8

By this point, she told us, some sellers were now forcing buyers to waive inspection--basically saying, "If you don't bring your inspector when you come see the house, we won't let you inspect it later."

Because when market forces let people get away with that, they will. /9

Anyways, all the home we're buying has to do now is appraise, which I think it will.

But the experience getting to this point was eye-opening for sure.

The dysfunctional behavior, ham-fisted tactics, chicanery, all enabled by the market, made the market even worse for us. /10

We got off lucky. One of the homes we saw ended up going for almost 50K over list price. I have to think it went to a buyer who waived the appraisal, because there's no way that house appraised for what it sold for.

But that's the competition here. And it's not sustainable. /11

Solutions are above my pay grade, but fundamentally, when we treat housing as investment opportunities and not as stability and security for human beings, this is always going to end up happening, and it'll be people who suffer by being further priced out of home ownership. /end