Raleigh home real estate market on fire -- thanks to Millennial buyers

Realtor Frankie Hagan said 2018 is shaping up to be one of the best years in the real estate industry for sellers and buyers.

“It’s a great time to be a seller, but it’s still not a bad time to be a buyer,” Hagan said. “You know houses really sell themselves.”

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Millennial buyers who are moving into ownership as first-time home buyers may be fueling the residential real estate market growth, industry observers say.

The technologically-savvy generation is using the Web and mobile apps to power their new home search.

“Well, the thing that’s happening in the Triangle is we’re starting to get the first boom of Millennials purchasing houses, and it’s a different type of market because they’re very internet savvy,” Hagan said.

Before 2016, the real estate market in Raleigh was stagnant, with home prices stuck in the basement, some realtors say. But that was before the Triangle’s surging tech industry transformed the region into a hot destination for buyers.

The area’s growing population is adding to the competition to buy and close on new homes.

Local realtors say buyers are closing on new homes in as little as a month or a few days, depending on the cost.

”Of course certain areas are hotter than others, like the Cary area people very much want to get in those school districts, and so a lot of times they will pounce on things sometimes the very day it goes up,” Hagan said.