Maricopa housing recovery one of Valley’s best

Maricopa’s housing market may have been one of the hardest hit in the state, but that also means it could have one of the best recoveries.

According to a report released Thursday by the W.P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University, the price of homes has gone up, but the number of houses available for sale under $500,000 has gone down.

The report cites median single-family home prices in the Phoenix area have increased 25 percent — from $112,000 to $140,000 — between April of last year and April this year.

However, the report also cites a shortage of available homes to buy.

“I’d say we’re definitely seeing an increase in prices and we’re definitely seeing a shortage of supply (in Maricopa),” said Dayv Morgan, a real estate agent for ByTig Real Estate Corporation.

Rita Weiss, broker and owner of Desert Canyon Properties, agreed.

“If you pull up any home under $100,000, only one will come up,” Weiss said. “Inventory is low. It’s the lowest it’s been in years.”

The shortage of homes to bid on, however, is a natural part of the recovery.

“This is the only way (a recovery) happens,” said Mike Orr, director of the Center for Real Estate Theory and Practice at the W.P. Carey School of Business. “You end up with a glut of houses and eventually the glut gets eaten up.”

In Maricopa’s case, Orr pointed out its recovery — one of the best in region — correlated with its housing market crash, which was one of the worst in the Valley.

“It’s probably an extreme recovery because it’s been an extreme collapse,” Orr said. “(Maricopa) was expanding the fastest, just at the wrong time, at the height of the bubble.”

He pointed out the crash and recovery would not be uniform throughout the city.

Retirement communities, for example, “will be affected quite differently.”

Orr said this is because in retirement communities, many of the homes were purchased with large down payments or owned outright and the majority of occupants are not in danger of losing their employment.

“So there are far fewer foreclosures, fewer bank-owned homes and less downward pressure on pricing,” Orr said.

For buyers looking to become first-time homeowners or hoping to get a bargain, however, the higher home values have translated into stiffer competition to get into a home when one is available.