Portland Market Pop?

[Kevin Jorgensen]

I recently had a house I was looking to purchase jump 75k in one week. It was enough to put me off buying and back into the research process. I came across this article (https://www.realestateconsulting.com/where-are-we-...) that points to Portland as being on the verge of a downturn 

If the proposed phase 4 / 5 can take up to 3 years combined, I'm back to "predicting the future" and determining if today's lower rates and higher costs trump tomorrows potentially lower costs, but likely higher rates.

I've asked about opinions on the Portland market before, and generally have heard that prices will stagnate but not drop until perhaps four years from now once starts outpace the need.

Any other research I should consider before deciding if I should/should not buy high with low rates?

[Mike Nuss]

@Kevin Jorgensen I think the masses are less worried about an actual downturn/crash because the financials of 2018 are very different than 2006. Lending has been much tighter, building supply much slower (although speeding up past few years) and the market has a different kind of demand (as well as effective purchasing power of that demand). I've been saying the market will slow down for the past two years. It did a bit the past year, we're no longer the top 1-2 appreciating markets in the top 20 MSA (per Case schiller), but values have still been going up, just at a lower rate. 

You definitely have reason to pause. Affordability is declining (and only gets worse as rates rise while prices continue to rise) and the tech sector seems to be slowing a bit, but migration is still happening and the financial basics of Portland are very strong.