7 Luxury Real Estate Trends for 2013

Concierge

by Mike Russo

Our business at Concierge Auctions focuses on premier, high-end real estate in luxury markets nationwide. Unlike traditional brokerage, whereas the main focus is to keep a strong pulse on local transactions and trends, we strive to maintain not only such local knowledge in our target markets but also knowledge of national and international dynamics.

One reporter we constantly follow is Morgan Brennan, Forbes magazine real estate editor. We were thrilled to have Morgan join The Key 2012 luxury real estate conference in Las Vegas and speak to our 70+ guests, which included brokers and industry leaders from across the nation. While she spent plenty of time talking about trends within various luxury real estate markets, Morgan also informed the crowd on big picture, global real estate and economy issues.

Keeping with the entrepreneurial theme of the conference, Morgan described Forbes as a 75-year-old startup. She told the crowd that she can’t remember seeing “Most Expensive” in headlines more times than this past year, and that ‘Property Porn’ involving celebrities or infamous homeowners is the most viewed real estate related content online.

She then got into the nitty gritty of hard numbers and real estate trends and what we should expect to see over the next year. Below are my top 7 Luxury Real Estate Trends to look for in 2013, as discussed by Morgan Brennan at The Key.

1. “National Real Estate: 4% appreciation in values, existing home sales up. Expect these numbers to climb.”
2. “Home buying hot spots: Tech hubs, energy belt, Safe-haven cities, Luxury second home markets” and “Best market for home prices: Arizona.” The reference to luxury second home markets was no surprise to us, as the majority of our properties fit this category. Our inquiries from buyers searching for premier homes in choice locations — our bread and butter — nearly doubled in 2012 from the year prior.
3. “Who is buying? 1st time home-buyers, investors, foreign buyers, billionaires.” Most of our interaction is with the foreign buyer and billionaire categories. There’s no doubt their interest and involvement is growing. We certainly find investors bidding during our auctions too, but typically the end-users who are going to live in and enjoy the properties are the winning buyers.
4. “Properties that seem to be moving at the top end of the market seem to be bargains.” We’ve experienced this with some of our sales, but we also spurred a number of notable and record transactions in 2012, including Pa Gomo, Rocky Creek Ranch and Secret Beach. In an auction atmosphere, the price simply comes down to the registered bidders. There’s always a chance for a great bargain, but then again, if the property is highly-desirable, the competition will drive the price.
5. “2013 projections: 8% increase in home sales (NAR Economic Forecast 2013).”
6. “Keeping my eye on Real Estate technology, specifically Dot Loop, Block Shopper, and Red Fin.” Real estate technology is becoming more and more important in this fast-moving world. At Concierge Auctions, our precisely-targeted digital and online initiatives are growing our global database of over 150K luxury buyers and agents by the minute. We keep these clients updated with comprehensive email campaigns for each auction we conduct. That is in addition to our main website, social media campaigns and other online outreach. Our in-house staff utilizes a number of third-party services to most efficiently serve our clients, so it will be interesting to watch these and other real estate technology companies.
7. “One thing I expect to see more idea of ‘global broker’ aka broker that facilitates sale of many properties.” This will be an interesting trend to watch. Most of our buyers today are interested in various properties — a Rocky Mountain ranch, a Hawaiian oceanfront estate AND a slopeside ski chalet. It would be helpful if they could use one, trusted broker to guide them through all of those pursuits.