Housing Market on Coast Recovering Since Recession

The price of single family housing in south Mississippi is on the rise, and it’s not a bad thing. Since the recession hit, the housing market has struggled to recover, but realtors say it’s finally coming back.

Joe Rogers has sold real estate across the country for more than 30 years. He now serves as the Executive Director of the Mississippi Gulf Coast Association of Realtors. He says the 2008 recession has held back the value of the housing market on the Coast. Rogers says, "Our numbers reflect what they would’ve been in 2004, so we lost 10 years of value."

As the economy on the Coast improves post Hurricane Katrina, Rogers sees the market becoming more valuable. Rogers also says, "Some modest improvements, and I think you’re gonna’ continue to see that, until you see maybe a national economy turn over and maybe some job growth. It’s all about jobs, if you have good paying jobs, you’re gonna’ have people that are stable, can afford homes, and pay for them.”

Right now, the average home in Mississippi is $129,000. That’s $2,000 more than last year. Rogers also says, "If you keep going back year by year, it’s growing, it’s slow, but it’s moving forward and that I think will instill consumer confidence."

The only thing in the way of the Coast’s housing market is the price of insurance. State Insurance Commissioner, Mike Chaney, says that’s soon to change. Chaney closes, "We’ve been able to kinda’ level out insurance rates on the wind pool, now commercial rates have gone down, and homeowner rates ex winds have gone down. We’ll probably announce more reductions over the next few months."

Chaney says if developers build houses out of the flood zones, the price of housing and insurance will become even more attractive to buyers.