Be honest. Have you started looking at homes online yet? If you have, it’s already time to get pre-approved. Because here’s what not enough people know.

If buying a home is on your radar – even if it’s more of a someday plan than a right now plan – you don’t want to wait until later on in the process to tackle this step.

No matter what you’ve heard, pre-approval isn’t about commitment. It’s about clarity.

And here are the two big ways pre-approval sets you up for success. 

You Know Your Numbers Up Front 

During the pre-approval process, a lender will walk through your finances and tell you what you can borrow based on your income, debts, credit score, and more. And once you have that number, your search becomes a lot more focused.

With a mortgage pre-approval, you know what you can borrow, so it’s easier to figure out your ideal price point, and what you can actually afford. And that clarity is key.

Because if you just start browsing online and just guess at your price point, you run the risk of falling for a house that’s outside of your price range – or missing out on ones that aren’t.

You want this number to be clearly defined before your search. Here’s why.

You Can Move Quickly When You Find the One

This is how a lot of home searches go today. You scroll through listings just to see what’s out there, and then it happens. You fall in love with something you’ve seen online.

If you’re already pre-approved? You’re probably in great shape.

But if you’re not…

Instead of being able to jump on that house and quickly make an offer, you have to scramble to get a lender, gather the financial documents, and then submit the necessary pre-approval paperwork first. And while you’re waiting to hear back from your lender, someone else who’s more prepared could beat you to the house. As Bankrate explains:

“The best time to get a mortgage preapproval is before you start looking for a home. If you find a home you love but don’t have a preapproval in hand, you likely won’t have time to get preapproved before you need to make an offer . . .”

And that’s avoidable, with the right prep.

Because while you can’t control when the right home shows up, you can be ready for it. Think of it like showing up to the starting line with your shoes tied and your warm-up done – while everyone else is still looking for parking.

It’s not about rushing your timeline. It’s about removing the delay between finding the right home and being able to move on it.

One Thing You Need To Know About Pre-Approvals

Speaking of timing, pre-approvals do have an expiration date. So, be sure to ask your lender how long it’s good for. The Mortgage Reports explains:

“Mortgage preapproval letters are typically valid for anywhere from 30 to 90 days. However, a preapproval can be updated and extended if the lender re-checks your information.”

Doing the right prep and knowing this information can make the whole process a lot smoother.

You don’t have to be ready to buy to be ready to buy.

Getting pre-approved doesn’t mean you’re committing to buy right now. It just means you’ve taken a step to understand your numbers. And when a home catches your attention, you’re prepped and good to go.

Bottom Line

Ask yourself this: if your perfect home popped up tomorrow, would you be ready to make a move?

If the answer is no and you want to buy, it may be time to get pre-approved. You don’t feel behind before your search even officially kicks off.

Spend about 5 minutes online searching for news about the housing market, and odds are you’ll see something pop up about home prices. You may even stumble onto social media influencers saying we’re headed for a crash. Let’s get you the context you need.

The truth is prices are going to vary depending on where you live. But they’re not crashing.

Here’s what you need to know.

The Local Perspective: Home Price Trends by Area

The biggest thing feeding into the confusion online is how different home price trends are by area right now. Take a look at this data from ResiClub and Zillow (see graph below).

About half of the largest metros are seeing prices go up.

The other half are seeing some declines.

Unfortunately, the online chatter only focuses on the markets where prices are down – and that makes it sound like something bigger is happening.

But, as you can see in this graph, that’s only one side of the story. The full picture is different.

The National Perspective: Moderate Price Growth

As a country, when you average it all together to get a true baseline, one thing becomes clear, home prices are still net positive at the national level.

According to the Redfin, national home prices were up about 1% year-over-year in February. So, what we’re seeing right now isn’t a collapse. It’s a market that’s normalizing after a period of unusually fast growth. And that impacts some local markets more than others – particularly those where prices rose too far, too fast during the pandemic. 

A true crash, like what happened in 2008, would mean prices dropping sharply across the entire country. That’s just not what the data shows today. And it’s not where things are going either.

Experts Agree This Isn’t 2008

In fact, Fannie Mae surveyed over 100 housing market experts to ask their opinions on where prices are headed from here. And the experts agree, nationally, prices are expected to keep rising over the next five years: 

That rise will be moderate, particularly this year, but the trend is clear. Nationally, prices are forecast to grow every year now through at least 2030 – and that’s normal. Daryl Fairweather, Chief Economist, at Redfin explains:

“House prices aren’t going to fall on a national scale any time soon—and that’s actually a good thing. It’s normal for house prices to rise gradually over time . . .”

That’s why even in the select areas where prices have dropped slightly this year, the decline is expected to be temporary. According to that same quarterly Fannie Mae survey mentioned above, 85% of the experts say the markets that are seeing mild declines right now will return to positive price growth before the end of 2027.

The main takeaway? This isn’t a crash. And prices aren’t expected to fall nationally. If anything, the few areas experiencing declines are expected to rebound in the next year or so.

Bottom Line

It’s easy to get caught up in headlines that make it sound like something big is about to happen. But don’t be fooled. The housing market isn’t crashing. It’s just shifting.

The key is understanding what’s actually happening in your market, so you can make the right move for you. Connect with a real estate agent if you want the local perspective.

There’s a lot of noise out there right now about investors in the housing market.

Some headlines make it sound like big Wall Street firms are buying up everything in sight. And if you’re trying to purchase a home yourself, that can make it feel like the odds are stacked against you.

But when you take a closer look at the data, a very different picture starts to come into focus.

Most Investors Are Just Everyday Owners

For starters, when you hear the word investor, you probably picture big corporations. And that misconception is a large part of what’s feeding into the myth that they’re buying up all the homes.

Most investors aren’t big companies, at all.

They’re everyday people just like you.

They’re someone who owns a second home (like a vacation house at the river), a neighbor who has 1 or 2 rentals, or even a homeowner who tried to sell their home, didn’t get the price they wanted, and decided to rent it instead.

And when all of these groups are lumped together in the headlines, the number of investors sounds high – especially if you’re operating under the assumption all investors are big investors.

But here’s what the numbers really show when you drill down.

Institutional Investors Are a Small Slice of the Housing Market

Large institutional investors, those big companies buying homes, actually make up a very small share of the overall housing market.

According to BatchData, the largest investors (those with 1,000+ homes) own just 0.4% of the 86 million single-family homes in the country. And their share of the market is actually shrinking.

Data from Parcl Labs shows big investors are selling 4 homes for every 1 they’re buying right now (see visual below):

That means they’ve actually added almost 1.7k homes back into the market lately.

What This Means for You

The story is clear. Instead of aggressively buying up homes, most of these companies are stepping back, which means less competition from them than you might expect. If you were someone who thought they were dominating the market, let that give you some peace of mind.

Most of the competition you’ll face is from other everyday buyers – people just like you. And with most large investors stepping back, there may be more opportunity in the market than you think.

Bottom Line

It’s easy to assume big investors are taking over the housing market, but the data tells a different story. If you want an expert’s opinion on what investor activity looks like in our area, talk to a local agent.

Because odds are, it’s not as big a factor as you may think.