MANITOWOC (NBC 26) — In the state of Wisconsin, home sales fell by 21% from last May to this May. In the same period, price the median price of a home rose 7% to $294,000.
According to realtor Tiffany Holtz, this problem is not due to demand.
"I mean our inventory levels, this is the lowest I've seen. I've been doing this for 23 years and I've never seen something quite like this", Holtz said. "There is a demand for housing that we can't keep up with right now because we just don't have enough homes on the market. If we had more houses on the market we'd have more sales"
Realtors, like Rocky Cohen in Manitowoc, say the problem is the lack of home sellers. That's because many are staying in their homes longer due to having locked in lower mortgage rates years ago... some as low as 2%.
"Now the interest rates are hitting 6, 7 percent," Cohen said. "So people don't want to leave their 2 percent mortgage to get a 7 percent mortgage because that's just a huge hit"
Data from the Wisconsin Realtors Association shows there has been a 29% decrease in houses purchased in Manitowoc County alone from May to May, one of the highest drops in Northeast Wisconsin.
"It's also really hard to find a home if you don't want to overpay for a home", said Cohen. "And a lot of buyers don't want to do that".
One prospective buyer caught in the middle of this housing shortage is Jacquelyn Starr. She's looking for a home in Manitowoc with her husband and four sons.
"They're excited to get their own room and they're picking out paint colors and floor samples," Starr says. "Then when we don't get it, it's kind of depressing in a way".
Second-quarter data from the Wisconsin Realtors Association shows when a home went up for sale in the City of Manitowoc, it was on the market for a median of only 5 days.
Despite the challenges in this tight housing market, Starr says she and her family are not going to give up.
Star said, "You know we're going to keep looking, we want a house, we need a house. So we are going to keep looking".
For the time being, Holtz said there is only one thing buyers can do.
"When you have a high buyer demand in a low inventory and you're a buyer in today's market, you really have to be patient."
