hello everyone and welcome to another

episode of selling Greenville your

favorite real estate podcast in

Greenville South Carolina I'm your host

Stan mun realtor right here in the

Greenville area and you can find all of

my contact information in the show notes

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happy New Year everyone I'm recording

this on New Year's Eve and so uh this

show will will be released on New Year's

Day we will'll be interesting to see how

many people watch or listen to it on New

Year's Day but I'm sure I'll get some

some watches and some listens um in the

preceding days and weeks um but as we

round out 20124 enter into 2025 we're

going to um we're I'm almost done with

with kind of my end of year beginning of

year episodes but today I want to

discuss my bold predictions for 2025 we

just went over my bold predictions for

2024 and what I got right what I got

wrong so here we go pressure is on will

I do well with my bold predictions in

2025 I wasn't really happy with my bold

predictions in 24 um so I want to see

some improvement we need to to get

better at this right um now 2024 was an

extremely challenging year to predict on

so many different levels there were so

many things happening um so it I feel

like in some ways I did pretty well but

again I wasn't satisfied with those

results so hopefully I will do better uh

with this year and I'm just going to

jump right in with the number one

question right the the thing that the

entire housing market hinges on right

now mortgage rates what will happen with

regard to mortgage rates in

2025 and here is my bold prediction

number one is that mortgage rates will

will remain above 6% per mortgage News

Daily for the entire ire year okay so

where do they sit right now currently

they sit at

7.06% on mortgage News Daily if you go

on that website that's for the 30-year

fixed rate mortgage reminder as always

that doesn't mean that that's what your

rate is that just means that that's what

an aggregator mortgage News Daily has

pulled together uh for a lot of people

across the

country um the average person with a

very good credit score um good uh

history in terms of their credit and in

terms of home ownership and all of that

would likely do better than 7.06 today

but that's between you and your lender

they have to tell you that um but my

prediction is that we're not going to

see rates go below 6% and that's the the

only thing I feel confident in saying um

I do think that we will see most of the

year in the 6% range um you know right

now we're we're sitting in the low six

in the low sevens um um I I suspect it

might get worse before it gets better

but I do think at some point we will see

it come back into the sixes and maybe by

the end of the year we're in the low

sixes but if it went into the fives I

would be truly truly surprised at this

point it looked like uh earlier in 2024

that maybe we would see rates start to

retreat into the fives and that was what

a lot of people were predicting and a

lot of people were predicting it'll go

into the fives in 20125 not quite ready

to make that prediction yet because we

need to see what is going to happen in

the Trump economy right we need to know

you know how many tariffs and how

restrictive of tariffs are is Trump

going to impose and and there's debates

over whether tariffs are inflationary or

not um well the debates don't matter

that much at the end of the day because

what matters more is perception uh when

it comes to mortgage rates at least so

if the market if the if investors not

the real estate market but the investor

Market if they believe the tariffs are

inflationary then once Trump you know if

he imposes big tariffs what's going to

happen is the bond market is going to go

wacky right people are going to uh pull

money out of the bond market that's

going to send treasury yields soaring

and that's going to cause mortgage rates

to go up um if the investor

Market is kind of looking back at 2018

when Trump imposed his tariffs last time

he didn't do it in 2016 right so that's

another wild card we don't even know if

these tariffs are going to happen this

year because if we look at his at his

blueprint from his last presidency he

waited a couple years before he uh

imposed those tariffs um so that's

another thing to consider as well but

long story short um if um if we look at

2018 the tariffs weren't infl were not

inflationary that Trump imposed but they

also weren't as Extreme as he had

proposed um and the economy was

completely different back then right we

we weren't uh trying to reduce inflation

in 2018 we were comfortable with where

inflation was and and the Fed was just

trying to figure out what was happening

um and they didn't overreact and it

turns out the tariffs didn't end up

being inflationary but they can be

particularly in the short term U most

economists think they would be um and so

so here we go we've got a lot of things

in in this pot that are all being

stirred together and none not the least

of which is what the Federal Reserve is

going to do now I've said on the show if

you've been listening to several episod

past several episodes Federal Reserve

has been cutting rates but that hasn't

caused mortgage rates to come down and

that's because again it has more to do

with treasury yields what's happening on

that side than it does with uh with what

the Federal Reserve is doing on the FED

funds rate with regard to what happens

with mortgage rates um that being said

the FED funds rate and maybe more

importantly what the Fed says the fed's

statements their projections their

predictions all of that um that does

indirectly impact all of these things

because it impacts investor Behavior

which then impacts treasury yields okay

so the FED is um is at the you know at

the they're steering the ship here okay

either directly or

indirectly and what they do does have

importance even though uh their more

recent rate Cuts have not translated

into mortgage rates going down um and

interesting thing right now is uh uh fed

Reserve J Powell came out with some

comments uh after the the most recent

rate cut that they made in the month of

December and he said that they are not

uh trying to make any predictions with

regard to what the Trump Administration

is going to do they are simply focused

on data well that's simply not true

um and we know that's not true because

they were rised as soon as Trump was

elected they rised how many rate Cuts

they were predicting to make in

2025 um and now they're predicting that

they're going to make fewer rate Cuts in

2025 well how does that happen after a

president gets elected if you're not

projecting that that president is going

to do things that impact you know the

economy and and where rates need to be

and and inflation all of that um very

clearly they are looking at Trump's

proposals and reading the tea leaves

there even though they are in denial

about that um J pal is trying really

really hard to not be partisan um but

the reality is that we know that the the

FED is partisan you can look at at who

they donate to um overwhelming

overwhelmingly Democrats um and so even

though they've done a pretty good job of

of not uh making decisions that would be

political politically partisan you know

like trying to wreck the economy when

there's a Republican president in office

or trying to really stimulate the

economy when there's a democrat in

office they haven't done that they're

not partisan of that way um but um but

they

clearly uh prefer Biden I or kamla I I

think that that is clear from the

standpoint of their job

predictability uh with what the markets

are going to do and uh with what they

will need to do in the future they

strongly preferred that but long story

short uh regardless of any of these

things I'm predicting that mortgage

rates will not go below 5% according to

mortgage News Daily now I've had clients

get four or five% the past few years uh

by means of of various lender programs

so it's not impossible um to get much

lower than what these uh standard

aggregated rates are uh but sometimes

you've got to get creative so uh let me

know if you have questions about that

happy to answer

those that was the big one uh but we've

got another big one here okay more on a

broader level because you know even

though this isn't specifically a

Greenville real estate and and some of

these a lot of these are not going to be

Greenville specific uh but this one's

not even real estate specific but it's a

very important question I asked the same

question last year it's worth asking

again this year two it's kind of a

two-part question right about the

broader economy will we have a recession

and will inflation go to 2% right the

the FED has said they are not going to

call calm down bring rates down until

inflation settles around 2% they keep

saying that they keep coming back to

that so what are my predictions here

well um I predicted that we would have

no recession in 2024 and I was right um

and I'm predicting once again that we

will have no recession

2025 um I think that the economy looks

fairly strong I think the potential for

uh for a bunch of negative GDP GDP

prints is fairly unlikely at this point

um again a lot hinges on these tariffs

and what happens with them nobody knows

um

but I tend to think that if if Trump did

something that immediately started to

cause negative GDP prints I think he

would immediately reverse course or

start doing stimulus or something to try

to reverse that um so I believe that

there will be no recession now as far as

inflation goes

that is a much harder thing to predict

okay um I believe okay and this is

really going out on a limb um I think

that we will see inflation return to at

or below 2% by the fourth quarter of

2025 um and the reason why I I believe

that I'm not going to get too In The

Weeds on this again this is a real

estate show it's not an economic show

and I'm not an economist um but just

what I'm seeing in the

data I'm I'm seeing a lot of there's a

lot of weakness in the underlying uh

economic data that I know the Federal

Reserve is seeing and that a lot of

other people are seeing but it's not

that weakness hasn't yet shown up yet

okay I'll just say it that way um but it

will right I think maybe we've been uh

propped up a little bit by the holidays

and and very things happening hurricane

Helen messed up a lot of things I I do

think that we'll see um some some

weakness in the economic data right not

a recession but weakness that comes in

that then drives inflation down um over

the course of the year it might get

worse before it gets better right we

might see inflation

uh start to go up a little bit again

tariffs could cause that we don't know

uh before it comes back down now if

you're an educated

listener which I'm not going to I'm not

going to tell you if you are or aren't

I'll let you be the decider of that um

but if you're you're a really educated

listener um then you're probably

wondering well by what metric are you

measuring whether we get to 2% inflation

or not um if you're on YouTube you can

see I'm sharing from federalreserve.gov

a page that says the economy at a glance

inflation in parentheses

pce uh this is one personal consumption

expenditures price index one of the main

measures of inflation um this is what

I'm going to be looking at currently as

of November obviously we don't have

December yet um I'm recording this the

end of December um so they don't have

December's data yet um but as of

November it was sitting at

2.4 um which was an increase from

2.1 in September 2.3 in October up to 2

.4 in

November um so we almost you know we

were September got to 2.1 so we almost

hit 2% uh but we've been we've been

increasing each month since since then

not surprisingly um and I again I

wouldn't be surprised if we continue to

increase a little bit before going back

down uh but it's been really hard to get

down to this 2% level I mean if you're

looking on YouTube you can see we've

been you know uh during the worst of

times in June 2022 we were at 7.2% you

know that was when uh that was when the

Federal Reserve started freaking out and

for good reason uh we don't want

7.2% uh inflation that's insane so this

this will be what I'm tracking as the

pce that will um that needs to go to 2%

by the fourth quarter for me to be

accurate on this

prediction number three and this is a

question um that then I will answer in

in the form of a prediction um are any

more big Chang changes coming to the

real estate industry okay specifically

in Greenville but also more

broadly and I just want to say something

before I answer this question and and

this applies to any of these questions

these are all opinions that I have

they're educated opinions but they are

not official statements and nothing I'm

saying on here is revealing any sort of

confidential information that I'm privy

to um that other people wouldn't have

access to let me say it that way way so

in answering this I'm not revealing

anything that I know uh from uh

connections that I may or may not have

um that you may or may not also have

okay so don't read into this beyond that

this is just me speculating um I don't

have some kind of weird Insider uh

inside track to uh to knowing the answer

to this anymore so maybe I have a little

bit more so but I'm not revealing

anything um in this answer uh that is uh

anything confidential that you wouldn't

be able to find out just by talking to a

few people um that know what they're

talking about in the industry okay any

big changes coming here's what I think I

think it'll be mostly business as usual

for 2025 with one exception I'm quite

confident that more paperwork changes

are coming from the South Carolina

Association of Realtors we had a lot of

paperwork changes in 2024 right as uh as

scr was trying to adjust on the Fly and

scram ramble to accommodate the sudden

release of the National Association of

realtor settlement uh from the sister

brnette lawsuit um a lot of changes

happened and those were reactionary

changes right these were we oh crap we

need to comply now um so that we don't

get in trouble with the with get into

legal trouble um or get into trouble

with the

N um well that was reactionary I think

that this year we're going to see more

forward looking more of a forward

looking approach that is saying

okay everything seems to be working but

maybe a few things could be better let's

change these things and let's also think

about down the road what will be the

more long-term impacts what are the

trends that we're seeing now from

brokerages all across the state and how

can we bake those those into um our

contract paperwork and the various

paperwork that we have um so

unfortunately if you're a realtor

listening to this um and I know several

that do um you're going to have to go to

more training for more paperwork I'm

sorry and if you're uh someone that

bought or sold a home a few years ago um

and and you're looking at maybe buying

or selling a home in

2025 I've got some some well it might

not be the worst news for you but

basically anything you think you knew

about the contract back then about the

real estate process back then you're

going to have to be brought back up to

speed it's different now and it's going

to continue to be different in 2025 now

do I think we're going to see major

changes with the multiple listing

service major changes with clear

cooperation uh which is inside baseball

talk that I'm not going to get into um I

think it's

possible but um at the moment I'm

leaning towards no I'm leaning towards

that that probably those things are

going to more or less it like I said be

business as usual um that the current

rules are going to remain the current

rules current structur is going to

remain the current structure and I just

think that the biggest thing we're going

to run into is um on the paperwork side

of things that we're going to see the

South Carolina Association of Realtors

and and perhaps even the local

Association combined with local

brokerages I think are going to um be

changing a lot when it comes to

paperwork um what about prices in

Greenville okay so uh we track or on the

show I track with you guys the median

price point for uh for Greenville which

is not exactly appreciation or

depreciation uh but it's the closest

metric that we have for tracking it so

again if you're on YouTube you can look

at our most recent Market

stats um which was the month of uh which

came out in November covering you know

what actually I pulled up the wrong ones

hold on give me one second here

H would be good if I pulled up the right

thing here um well you know what it

doesn't really matter for the purposes

of this episode basically we have now

had multiple straight months and I

already discussed this with you guys

we've had three straight months of um of

negative uh appreciation or what you

would possibly call depreciation now

again we have to be careful with what

we're how we word this how we say this

because when we're looking at the medium

price point we're not exactly precisely

looking at appreciation or

depreciation um it is that right it it

it does track that so like when we were

seeing insane

appreciation um during okay and I I

finally I apologize for that I finally

pulled it up for some reason uh my

computer did not want to find the uh the

most recent Market set so I'm pulling

that back up if you're on YouTube to

give you something to look at besides my

my lovely face

um when we were seeing insian

appreciation back uh back in 2020 21 uh

first half of

2022 uh the the median sales price was

taking off right and if you want to look

back at the at the great financial

crisis um 2007 through you know roughly

2012 you see that that was also

reflected in the median sales price

so what you don't want to do is to

overreact too strongly to monthon Monon

trends for this but once you start

to see a pattern that's when it starts

to become something that's noteworthy

right so we now have a pattern of three

straight months where the year on-year

percent change is in the negatives for

the medium price point that very well

could indicate a depreciating

environment I would like to see a little

bit more data before I come to that

conclusion um three months small sample

size right that's one quarter um I I'd

like to see a little bit more before

concluding that we are in a

depreciating Market here in Greenville

specifically um but that's what's

happening currently but here's what I'm

thinking is going to happen with regard

to the median sales price for the year

2025 I think it's going to be between

negative - 1% and 2% for the year as

opposed to 2024

so uh I don't yet know what the uh the

final median sales prices for

2024 you'll have to tune in with me in a

few weeks whenever the December Market

stats get published so that we can talk

about that um November was sitting at

3,000 uh three sorry 305,000 was what

November was sitting at um I I'd be

surprised if December doesn't jump up a

little bit from that number um but

basically we're going to be needing to

see prices uh in in order to get better

than that uh we're going to need to see

prices you know

go up into the the 310 or something like

that um to to hit you know around that

2% number U but I'm also saying like I

said I'm doing a range here I did last

year I did a range between zero and 3%

this year I'm dialing that back a little

bit to minus 1% to 2% we might see a

year of prices getting better for buyers

we might see year prices staying

slightly stable getting a little bit

better for sellers um but uh 2%

appreciation if we if we think about

this specifically as two as

appreciation that's that's almost not

even noticeable right like that's that's

very very basic very very steady um and

here's why you don't want

to another reason why the median sales

price isn't a perfect measure it's a

good measure of appreciation or

depreciation but it's not perfect again

you can have a a a builder that sell

sells off a bunch of homes all at the

same time that really skews the stats

for one month or you could have um an

investor liquidate a bunch of really bad

rental properties we had this happen in

Gaffney a few years ago um bunch of

unlivable I mean these these places

stunk I showed a bunch of them uh these

apartments they were awful sold off

several hundred apartments in Gaffney um

and that you know that kind of stuff you

know you you sell off a bunch of

apartments for3 ,000 a pop because

they're unlivable that skews these stats

so these are the sorts of things that

this is why I don't base anything off of

one month here one month here I want to

see a trend line um and right now the

trend line is not super positive if

you're a seller great if you're a

buyer um but I think that it's going to

be a year of very minimal if any

appreciation is kind of the long story

short and by the end of the year we'll

see if we're um around minus betweenus

1% and 2% appreciation that would put us

right in line with what 2024 was um so

if you're wondering what will 2025 be

like in terms of prices I'm predicting

it'll be pretty comparable to

2024 all right um number five here um

and I've got 10 of these by the way in

case you're wondering number five out of

10 will membership in the greater

Greenville Association of Realtors go up

or down all right um now this is

probably more interesting to Realtors

than non- Realtors listening to the show

um but if you're a non realtor it should

be interesting to you as well some of

you guys might want to become Realtors

um and um you know we hear a lot there's

too many realtors in Greenville and in a

lot of ways that can be true right um

there's there's too many bad realtors in

Greenville okay if they were all good we

wouldn't say there's too many of them um

but the problem is there there's too

many and this isn't a Greenville

phenomenon it's just a nationwide

phenomenon it doesn't matter how much we

try to improve our training or anything

like that there's always going to be

people that are bad at what they do it's

just the reality of the situation I'm

not trying to be pus here um but

um but long story short this is a big

question of now that we've had all of

these different changes that have

happened the past year with realtor

compensation and all these different

forms and now there's so many more Hoops

that we have to go through membership

going to go up or down and it's been a

long time since it's gone down uh but I

do in fact think that it will go down in

2025 I think we'll see see a increase in

membership at the moment um uh according

to the multiple listing service um I

pulled some uh some numbers that would

indicate that our current membership is

5,90 all right so I'm going to predict

that that number is going to be below

5,000 uh by the end of

2025 um so uh we we'll see well you know

I'm I'm not going to say I'm just going

to say it's going to be below 5,90

because if I say that 5,000 number

that's going to confuse me later uh when

I come back and review these so let's

just say it's just going to be below

5,90 it's going to be below what what it

uh what it is today um moving right

along here number six

inventory or Supply will inventory go up

or down um here is what I think and I'm

going to I'm going to go ahead and and

pull up again for those looking on

YouTube I'm going to pull up the

inventory the the most recent inventory

numbers for you guys to to be able to

look at here um

inventory in in Greenville has been

quite High uh this year um it's at uh

it's at a pretty high number at the

moment it's comparable to uh 2015 um

interestingly that's not reflected in

the entire state of South Carolina the

that's not everywhere um here if you

look at numbers for the entire state of

South Carolina actually the state as a

whole is it has less inventory than it

did in 2019 so Greenville has a lot more

inventory than uh than most of South

Carolina which is which is a a good

thing in my opinion we needed more

inventory um it's bad the way it

happened though it happened more because

of not because of a lot more building uh

to basically uh give all the demand

options uh the reason why we're having

the spike in inventory it's more of a

demand story than a supply story we

haven't had increased Supply um in terms

of in in terms of increased units being

built as as much as we should have so

much as we've just had decreased Demand

right so

Greenville uh the reason why Greenville

has been impacted more so than other

parts of the state is that Greenville a

major appeal of Greenville is cost of

living so when you've got the cost of

living being so much higher and we look

at the housing affordability index it's

not been great for quite some time now

and a lot of that is mortgage rates that

really mortgage rates really hurts

Greenville more so than other markets

because Greenville is a market driven by

affordability on uh on many levels so uh

what am I predicting for for supply for

inventory will go up and down I think

we're going to continue to see month-

on- Monon increases in

Supply uh in inventory until February or

March probably it that the increases

will continue until March but somewhere

in that time frame somewhere the

increases will continue through the

first quarter and then at some point

either in or after the first quarter the

month- on-month increases in Supply will

stop but the year on-year increases will

continue until June or July okay what

what do I mean by all this so here's

what we've had so far month-to-month

increases uh we have

had well the entire year of

2024 every single month had more

inventory than the month prior okay and

the way this works is basically it's

just they look at what is what are the

number of active homes for sale at the

end of the month that's it every single

month at the end of it has had more

active inventory than the month prior

for the entire month of 2024 now we

don't yet have um the final numbers for

uh for

December but I'm going to look at this

real quick just in the multiple listing

service to just see what it says um and

for you know for whatever reason it's

never the same I never get the same

numbers as the greater Greenville

Association of Realtors does um and I'm

not entirely sure why let me try another

thing okay so if I just look at

multiclass which is basically anything

at everything um I come up with uh 5411

units which would be substantially up

that's not right I don't know we're

we're going to have to wait until we get

the greater geval Association numbers I

don't know if December is going to be up

or down

um from uh from November but long story

short I think we're going to see

month-to-month increases January is

going to be higher than December

February is going to be higher than

January and then Pro possibly March will

be higher than than February and then

we're going to start see decreases and

the reason why I think we're going to

start seeing decreases month- on Monon

uh is that there's going to be more

demand coming into the market a lot of

pent up demand I think will come into

the market in the the spring I'm seeing

some indicators of that

anecdotally um and it just makes sense

to me as well on a on a high level but

as far as year on-ear increases I think

we're going to continue to see year-

on-year increases until probably the

summer and that's what I'm saying June

or July so when we're comparing 25 to 24

typically we're looking at okay what is

you know March of 25 how does that

compare to March of 24 how does April of

25 compared to April of 24 and I think

those comparisons we're going to see

inventory be higher and higher and

higher year on year until we get to June

or July and then I think we're going to

start seeing um in or after those months

we're going to start seeing that the

year-on-year numbers are lower uh for 25

versus

24 and I'm I'm manifesting that because

I think that probably mortgage rates

will be lower year on year during that

period of

time um okay number seven pending sales

okay so we just talked about demand

sorry we just talked about Supply now

we're going to talk about demand which

is pending

sales and I'm going to pull this up if I

can ever find it uh for those of you on

YouTube um pending sales will they

continue to increase now if you're

looking on YouTube don't look at

November it looks like a big decrease uh

that that's the wrong number it's always

um it's always wrong for the most most

recent month and then they revise it and

it goes way up but you can see besides

that month every month has been an

increase year on-ear so the question is

whether that will continue are we going

to continue to see pending sales

increases uh year on-year for each month

in 2025 and I am going to predict that

yes we will see pending sales increase

year on year for every month we won't

have a single month in 2025 with a

decrease in Penning sales that's my

prediction and the reason for that

prediction is I think that more

inventory should mean more pendings

right there's more options for people so

they're going to be more likely to buy

prices being stable people aren't going

to be you know as priced out hopefully

people's wages go up while uh mortgage

rates come down a little while home

prices either stay where they are or go

down a little as well so that should

give people more purchasing power and

hopefully more demand will trickle into

the market as a result of all of these

things combined with just people being

forced to move right all these people

that have been waiting now since 2022

and and waiting for rates to go down

waiting for things to get more

affordable um that hasn't really

happened but maybe their wages have um

have improved to the point where now

it's like okay now we can finally do it

now we can finally make that move so I

think we're going to see a strong year

of pending sales is what I'm predicting

for

2025 uh number eight I'm let's think

about for a second uh cash transactions

versus financing I'm going to be talking

about this a little bit next week's

episode as well to to discuss what

exactly is happening on this front um

but I think we're going to see cash

transactions be between 21 to 23% of

closings for the year 2025 if that

sounds really high that over a fifth of

homes sold in Greenville would be bought

with cash just know that uh it's looking

like once all the data comes in from uh

2024 that it's actually going to be

higher than 23% so I'm actually

predicting that cash transactions will

go down a little bit um again as a

result of mortgage rates perhaps being a

little bit more affordable um and uh and

so I but I still think that we'll see

strong cash transaction 21 to 23% that's

still really strong right almost a

quarter of of transactions being bought

with

cash um during the height of all the

chaos with covid um it was right around

a quarter um and that wasn't because

mortgage rates were what they were that

was just because everyone was trying to

enter the market everyone was going

crazy um there was just a lot of a lot

of cash buyers that were out bidding

everyone else um now the cash that's in

the market is mostly just because people

can't afford mortgages and so they're

either they're left with either cash

buyers that are out there or cash buyers

that perhaps like parents um helping

their kids by buying cash on behalf of

their kids then maybe setting up you

know some kind of program for the kids

to pay them back or maybe not maybe the

parents are just helping the kids out um

which I am always in favor of because I

think that um that the current

Generation Um is going to be unable to

to purchase a home until their mid to

late 30s and I think that they do need

help from the parents um in one form or

another in order to to get that that

Foundation um that they need in order to

uh to be able to build on right just

like you know my generation our parents

had to help us with uh with college

tuition right that was that was how they

helped us in many ways well I think my

generation we're probably going to be

helping our kids uh purchase homes and

that's going to be a big part of it um I

and I will not be uh I'm I should be

careful what I say here I'm not

encouraging college debt on my kids at

all I think it's a terrible idea um but

I think uh debt in real estate something

that you um actually tangibly benefit

from actually use and need from day one

a little bit different

um I'm I'm much more willing to help my

kids out with something like that than

you know going out and getting a

psychology degree that will never pay

itself off um that's a whole rabbit I'll

probably just offended a bunch of people

sorry happy New Year uh all right number

nine here

um will Greenville County continue to

make owner restrictions on

development I I worded that with a

little a little bit of teeth and I am

going to predict yes Greenville County

is going to continue to restrict

development put more more onerous

standards more onerous restrictions on

developers and just on standard people

just you know and people think of

developers they think of these big

companies like you know like Meritage

and uh DR Horton and and uh companies

like that the county doesn't care

whether you're a a massive National

developer or a small-time local

developer they don't want you building

right now and guess what we've had a lot

of turnover in the County Council uh the

past year talked about that a little bit

on the show and none of it is good for

development there's not one person on

there that's Pro housing in the entire

group in fact um on County Council one

of the least Pro housing people is

someone who is a licensed realtor um and

that's not uncommon um and and you know

what I can understand Realtors being

against development right actually in

many ways can hurt us as Realtors um

when there's when there's more

development that's happening it's it's a

lot easier in our local real estate

market if we just don't build anymore

right we're just living with what we

already

have um but um regardless if you guys

have listened to the show very much you

know that I'm Pro development because I

think it's the best thing for Greenville

I don't care inherently about my bottom

line I think if Greenville continues to

get better my bottom line will take care

of itself right so I'm not I'm not uh

approaching this from a scarcity mindset

approaching this from an abundance

mindset and I think that everyone else

should do that as well um but long story

short I'm not sure what new restrictions

are coming down or going to come down

from uh County

Council um beyond what they've already

proposed but I I think that there's

going to be some proposals and some

things that pass this year that are

going to add some owner restrictions to

development I'm just going to leave it

at that um and we'll come back and we'll

see if they've been able to to do that

you know by the time we get to the end

of the year here

um the thing that could prevent them

from doing that would just be cons

trying to get consensus right right now

it's going to be a very fractured County

Council so it's going to be there's

going to be alliances that need to be

made and there's going to be you know a

lot of things that um that

are hotly debated and that they're not

going to be able to get a majority on

you know we've got a 12 Person County

Council there's going to be six6 votes

there's going to be a lot of six6 votes

there G to be a lot of five sevens

um and um there's already been a lot of

84s and 48s but now with the new Council

coming in it's going to be a lot of 66s

and a lot of 5 sevens so you need to be

prepared for that um and we'll see how

this impacts everything

else number 10 last but not least will

sellers stop paying Buyer Agents in 2025

okay this is if you're a realtor you're

you're really plugged in for this one

right um if you're not a realtor maybe

you don't know but there there were this

is where there were changes from the the

National Association of Realtors that

lost a lawsuit the sister berett lawsuit

um now there's been changes in terms of

how Buyer Agents can be compensated that

compensation can no longer be advertised

in any way associated with the multiple

listing service um but Buyer Agents can

still be

compensated um and so far they are still

being compensated now I'm not allowed to

discuss amounts commissions percentages

anything like that

very strict rule don't discuss those

things I did at one point I don't

anymore because I've learned that that's

a no no um and so um but I can tell you

without getting into those sorts of spe

specifics Buyer Agents are still getting

paid they're still getting paid because

sellers realize that Buyer Agents have

value and they realize that most buyers

have Buyer Agents and want Buyer Agents

um and so the the end result of that has

been that sellers wanting to sell their

homes particularly right now with a

slower Market they realize they've got

to Pony up some money for Buyer Agents

um now what's

different is that it used to be that the

seller paid the listing agent the entire

commission amount for both agents and

then it was the listing agent that split

that commission maybe 5050 maybe 4060

different different agents and and

brokerages had different models um but

they would they would split part of that

commission usually about half uh with

the buyer agent that brought the buyer

right and that was a pretty fair

Arrangement well the Department of

Justice doesn't like that they don't

think that list that uh sellers should

have to be on the hook automatically for

subsidizing a buyer agent for whatever

amount so what's changing now what has

changed is that now we have to

communicate you know if I have a buyer

client that's interested in home I have

to communicate because it can't be

publicly listed anymore I have to

communicate with the listing agent on um

on what percentage uh commission is

being uh or what amount of commission is

being offered to a buyer agent and the

second question that a lot of agents are

forgetting to ask right now is is that

coming directly from the seller or is

that coming from the listing brokerage

okay that's important for variety of

reasons uh which I'm not going to get

into the Weeds on here but I'm just

going to say this that most likely by

the end of 2025 I think pretty much all

the major brokerages in South Carolina

are going to make this strictly between

seller and buyer as negotiated by the

buyer agent and the listing agent okay

what do I mean by

that it's going to be when the seller

agrees to list their house with the

listing agent the commission offered is

going to be for the listing agent only

no no commission offered to a buyer

agent and then when a buyer comes along

with a buyer agent and the buyer agent

says hey are you offering a commission

that's going to be then something that

the seller has to agree directly with

the buyer of course the agents will be

the ones that that will be negotiating

that presenting that and all of

that um but long story short it will be

a separate agreement we've already been

doing this C Dan Joiner my company uh my

team the Morgan group we've been doing

this already uh for months now because

this policy was rolled out a long time

ago but a lot of brokerages aren't um

and uh and I think that by the end of

the year we're going to see this that

brokerages are going to make it they

don't pass through the buyer the the

buyer agent commission never flows

through the listing brokerage at all it

just ends up being something that the

seller pays the buyer agent directly at

closing and I think that by the end of

2025 that all major brokerages in South

Carolina are going to be using that

system versus the old system where it

flowed through the listing

brokerages

um but to my broader prediction there's

no way for me to to track that and to

tell you for sure whether that's the

case so that's not that that's a

prediction but that's not a prediction

that I'm going to attempt to verify

whether it's accurate or not the

prediction that I am going to uh hang my

hat on is that I believe Buyer Agents

are still going to get paid and I don't

believe that they're going to see any

meaningful reduction in how much they

get paid okay um that the Department of

Justice might call that price fixing um

that's because they don't understand the

economy um and that's just not how not

how anything Works look at any job in

the world there is set pay right if

you're a doctor you kind of know or if

you're trying to become a a a doctor

some sort of doctor a primary care

physician will just say if you're trying

to become a primary care physician or a

nurse practitioner you can basically

figure out what that would equate to in

terms of a salary right but apparently

Realtors aren't allowed to do that

that's price fixing that's ridiculous um

I have a big problem with that with the

Department of Justice but whatever

neither here nor there um the more

important things that sellers are

smarter than the Department of Justice

and they understand that Buyer Agents

need to be paid or else they'll just go

away and if Buyer Agents go away that's

a big problem I already talked about

that I'm not going to beat that dead

horse any more than it's already been

beaten um but my prediction is that

Buyer Agents will continue to get paid

and that it's going to be a big nothing

Burger those that are freaking out um

about you know that they're going to

that they're going to all lose their

jobs I don't think it's going to happen

um and so there you go rates I rund down

real quick rates are going to remain

above 6% for the entire year per

mortgage news dailies uh and there will

be no recession and inflation will

return to at or below 2% by the fourth

quarter um there won't be any major

impacts on the industry outside of

contracts paperworks I think we'll see

some changes there um in terms of

appreciation or depreciation I think

we'll see the median price uh for real

estate in Greenville go between minus 1%

uh which would be a 1% decrease or a 2%

increase uh for the year once it's all

said and done I think membership in gjr

is going to go down I think the

inventory is going to see month-to-month

increases for the first quarter and then

probably by the uh by the end of the

second quarter perhaps early third

quarter we will see the year onye

increases uh finally

stop pending sales I think will continue

to increase for every month in in the

year of 2025 I think we'll see 21 to 23%

of closings be cash versus financing I

think Greenville County is going to

sneak in some kind of new owner

restrictions on development and I think

that sellers will continue to pay Buyer

Agents because they see the value of

Buyer Agents those are my predictions

for 2025 I'm ready for the new year I

hope you guys are too I'm at a party

tonight it's going to be great um and uh

I'm looking forward to providing you

guys a bunch of content this new year so

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