One of the most importance considerations — whether you are buying or selling a home — is your local real estate market. Even though you hear about the “housing market” as though it is a behemoth, the fact of the matter is that your local real estate market is more important than the overall big picture. The Mortgage Reports uses a photo mosaic to represent this concept:

This photo represents the national real estate market.

If you look closely at the bigger picture, you can see your six neighborhoods mixed in. One’s up in the sky, another one’s in the grass, another one’s in the For Sale sign, and so on.  The picture is comprised of literally thousands of “neighborhoods”, each serving as a tile in a national real estate photomosaic.

The individual markets combine to create the “housing market” we hear so much about. However, when you are trying to buy or sell a home, it is important to understand how things are going in your local market. Home prices, time on the market and number of foreclosures all vary according to where you are. And that makes a difference in how things turn out for you.