Why Is It So Hard To Get A House In Davenport

I'm finally getting a house here in the Quad Cities, more specifically Davenport. I've been looking for a while now, and I was a bit shocked to find out that all the rumors about the housing market are true. Almost every bad thing you've heard about has happened to me.

From houses going way over their asking price to a house going off the market in less than a day, the market is wild! There is a reason or two for this. According to realtor.com,

While the market has, in fact, begun to cool off just a little, it’s still a highly challenging time to be looking to buy given the severe housing shortage. Even before COVID-19 turbocharged the demand for housing, buyers were struggling with rising prices and a severe lack of properties for sale.

Get our free mobile app

My Experience

The biggest issue I've had is how fast the homes sell. You really don't get a chance to think about whether or not you want to put a bid in on a house. For example, we found 2 houses we liked Saturday evening after both houses had been on the market for about 16 hours. By Sunday morning at 8 AM when we were ready to put in a bid... BOTH HOMES HAD ALREADY SOLD. It took a day for these houses to fly off the market.

The next issue is how much people go over the asking price. It use to be that if you went in at the asking price there was a good chance you'd get the home. Not any more.

On one house we went 5k over asking, basically waved inspections, covered radon mitigation, and covered closing costs. We were still outbid.

I've owned a house before too, I bought my first home in 2019 when the market was way less crazy. Needless to say, this time around is a lot more stressful.