MONTANA: The out-of-staters are coming, the out-of-staters are comin

THE OUT-OF-STATERS 

ARE HERE!

Montana is being overrun with out-of-staters who are buying and renting houses sight-unseen.  In Bozeman, the day a house - any decent house - goes on the market, it will have three or four offers before the sun sets the first day, and listed price means nothing.  These buyers are making offers thousands of dollars over the asking price.

"The Bozeman Daily Chronicle reported that the median sales price of a single-family home between November 2019 and November 2020 rose by nearly 50%!  That translated to an increase of $195,000 in Gallatin County, with the median home price going from $420,000 to $615,000 in February 2021.

The owner of one of the largest brokerages in Montana's largest city, Century 21 Hometown in Billings, was discussing Billings with a furniture salesperson as he was shopping.  Turns out, business was booming for both of them.  That's when the salesperson said that furniture could hardly be kept in stock, and 9-out-of-10 buyers were from out-of-state furnishing new Montana homes.  The realtor was seeing the same thing in his real estate agency.

It's an empirical fact that residential home sales in Montana have continued to push upward, and real estate professionals, housing advocates, and economists say 2020 saw fundamental changes to the state's housing market - in part, some suspect, because workers are also discovering that with a computer and internet connection, they can live anywhere!"        - source:  Darrell Ehrlick (Daily Montanan)

This "Zoom Boom" isn't just happening in Montana's big cities, either.  The small town of Fort Benton is reporting housing sales from out-of-staters, as well.  People are moving around town and no one knows who they are.

The real estate market in Helena, the Capitol, is the same.  There are relatively few active properties for sale in the city. That is leaving a lot of agents with near-empty listings to show and sell!  And, of course, nothing for buyers and renters to look at, either.

Montanans have been forecasting a run on their state by folks from across the nation for several years and it appears it has finally hit. They have money, computers to work from home, and a great urge to come to the "last best place."

There will be painful growing pains for we Montana natives, however.  Our younger adults will have a terrible time finds their "American Dream" in home ownership - and even as renters.  They will be priced out of the market quickly. This, plus our political climate in Montana that offers little-to-none help for our middle class workers is causing great concern.  The capitalists can only see the folks who are making the money and living in "fat city."

It's time for that building boom, and it won't come to soon!