Number Crunch

Most of Last Year’s Home Buyers Never Actually Set Foot in the House

2020 was the year of the Zoom-only home purchase

63%: That’s how many home buyers made an offer on a home in the past year without seeing the property in person, breaking the previous record of 45% set in July, according to a survey of 1,900 home buyers commissioned by the real estate brokerage Redfin.

One in 10 prospective home buyers are now requesting live-video tours with Redfin agents compared to less than 1% of buyers who made remote tour requests before the pandemic. Monthly viewings of 3D walk-throughs have also soared by a staggering 563% since last February.

Home buyers are flooding the market in hopes of a good deal: With 30-year fixed mortgage interest rates hovering at all-time lows of less than 3% and the possibility of remote work continuing past the pandemic, Redfin predicts that 14.5 million Americans will relocate to another town this year, leading to a 10% jump in overall home sales.

The Great Remote Migration remains one of the pandemic’s hottest market trends, with cities like Austin benefiting from the exodus of tech talent from Silicon Valley. Compass, the splashy real estate startup backed by Softbank, is also cashing in. Just two weeks ago, the…