Buffalo, N.Y. (WBEN) - Redfin says the average home value in Buffalo has increased faster than the national average. However, one local real estate leader tells WBEN that's not necessarily making homes less affordable.
Peter Hunt of Hunt Real Estate says his initial impression is there seems to be more activity moving towards the higher end of the marketplace.
"It doesn't mean that an individual property is going to be appreciating by 5 or 6%, whatever that amount is. But it means that the average of all the property sold has increased by that amount," said Hunt.
Hunt says if you generalize that 6% across every any individual property, that'll reduce the affordability of all homes, if that's the way people are thinking, but he and others don't.
"A real estate agent will approach that individual property to determine its market value based on the immediate neighborhood and comparable sales and their analysis of that individual property. An average like that will not necessarily mean that all affordability in western New York will decline," Hunt explained.
Hunt says the bigger reason affecting home affordability is the increase in interest rates.
"When interest rates double over a relatively short period of time, the affordability of any real estate goes down. It just does, and that's why prices across the whole country have tended to play out now," he said.
Hunt adds Fannie Mae is predicting that there will be a 4% increase in overall number of single family transactions across the country.
