Ignore Media Real Estate Trends

Many people tend to get caught up in real estate trends reported in magazines, newspapers and on television. It’s inevitable to see something you saw in the media and want to try it out for yourself. Many of the times, this could prove to be a mistake. Being a real estate investor has a lot to do with doing your research and determining what is best for you and your financial situation. Following the media crowd isn’t always the best thing to do in certain circumstances.

Ignoring Trends In Real Estate

In this modern information age, you can learn just about anything on a particular subject with the snap of your fingers. While access to information is usually a positive development, things can get a bit crazy if you get overloaded with it and get your information from sources that are not reputable. Look long enough and you can find two pieces of information offering exactly the opposite views on a subject. That doesn’t help you make a choice.

In real estate, the information offered in the media is usually uniform. For the last six or seven years, everyone has reported the real estate market has been hot. Now, many of these same pundits are suggesting the market is cooling off. Some are even predicting a crash in the market. When this happens, it can be difficult to determine where you should start when it comes to investing.

How should you evaluate the information being produced in the media? The simple answer is you should ignore it, do your research, and talk with people in your niche. The problem with these reports is not the accuracy. Instead, the problem is they are reporting national trends in real estate instead of offering up specific advice. They have little or no application to your specific area.

Real Estate And Your Location

Consider the following, the real estate market for the last few years has been reported as hot, hot, hot. In Colorado, however, the market has been flat throughout this time. If you were considering buying or selling in Colorado, the information being provided for national trends simply did not apply to you.

If you think Colorado is the exception, it is not. The state with one of the worst appreciation rates over the last four or five years, for instance, has been Texas. Put in practical terms, this means homes in Dallas, Houston, Denver, San Antonio and Houston have not followed national trends. The only real estate trends that matter are those in your local markets. Never rely on national data.

If you are considering buying, you have to be very careful when considering real estate trends. If it looks like a seller’s market in your area, you may make the mistake of not buying. Even in a seller’s market, buying a home is better than renting. Every day you are in the home is a day you are growing your wealth through equity accumulation.

It is easy to get caught up in real estate trends since they are plastered in front of your face daily. In truth, they really should not play much of a role in your decision making process. It’s important to consider the area that you want to buy in and to thoroughly investigate before making an accurate decision. The decisions you make in your real estate investing journey determine your overall equity or profitable return. Set yourself up for success first so that you don’t have to repair any major financial damage in the future.