Mary Beth: Hi. I’m Mary Beth Harrison with Dallas Native Voice. And today, I’m sitting with one of my favorite people, Chris Kelly, CEO of Ebby Halliday Incorporated of which Dave Perry-Miller is a part of.
Chris Kelly: A huge part of it.
Mary Beth: And so talk to me about, we had some really great news at the end of the year for our office, so talk about that.
Chris Kelly: So across HomeServices, there’s 900 offices and all over the whole country within the HomeServices-
Mary Beth: So HomeServices is the big name and the name and the sky.
Chris Kelly: Yeah.
Mary Beth: And then it goes down from there and to individual offices, correct?
Chris Kelly: It’s exactly right.
Mary Beth: Okay.
Chris Kelly: So HomeServices is technically our parent company, even though we’re part of Berkshire Hathaway.
Mary Beth: Okay.
Chris Kelly: So HomeServices is owned by Berkshire Hathaway. And so within HomeServices, they own about 45 separate real estate brokerages across the country.
Mary Beth: Okay.
Chris Kelly: And of those, there’s about 900 offices. And this particular Dave Perry Miller office reached number four and out of 900 in their growth for 2019.
Mary Beth: Wow. And growth is production and just office as a whole?
Chris Kelly: Yeah.
Mary Beth: Wow.
Chris Kelly: And so the production of the agents within the office. And so I got to send a lot of really fun messages to Lee Thomas this year and when those rankings would come out and say, “Man, you’re number ten. You’re number eight! You’re number four!”
Mary Beth: Wow.
Chris Kelly: Which is really just obviously in Lee being the guy that he is, always saying, “It is all about the agents of this office.” It was amazing.
Mary Beth: Yeah. Well, it’s incredible when you think about HomeServices goes from East coast to West coast.
Chris Kelly: Correct.
Mary Beth: So we know what the prices are at both ends of the spectrum here.
Chris Kelly: Yeah.
Mary Beth: So to think that we would be able to pull those numbers off is really impressive. That’s really cool.
Chris Kelly: Yeah.
Mary Beth: I’m proud of us.
Chris Kelly: It was awesome to see. And out of that top 25 that we would see on a weekly basis, it was really neat that on any given week, there were five to six offices just from the Ebby Halliday companies, which would be Dave Perry-Miller, Ebby and Williams Shrew that were in that top 25. So it really goes to show you how much great work was being done here in North Texas.
Mary Beth: Right. Well, and North Texas is rocking.
Chris Kelly: Yeah.
Mary Beth: I mean, we’ve all had a really great year and it’s due to a lot of factors. I wanted to get your take. We’re going to get our crystal ball out of the house. So we just want to be sure that, because we know that we’re both so brilliant looking forward rather than hindsight. So yeah, we know that. So…
Chris Kelly: Always.
Mary Beth: Yes. So I kind of want to look ahead now for 2020 and see, is this going to continue? Is the growth going to continue? Is the appreciation that we are so steady? I love that about Dallas/Fort Worth area. We’ve never had this huge spike. So just steady, steady, steady, steady. And I know people sometimes go, “Well, it didn’t go up that much. Are you kidding? Did your stock market go up?”
Chris Kelly: Right.
Mary Beth: So all of those are relative.
Chris Kelly: Yeah. And I always get scared when things go up too much, too fast. I mean, that’s when you… There’s always a correction.
Mary Beth: Absolutely.
Chris Kelly: And so steady growth is really what we’re after in real estate anyway.
Mary Beth: Yeah. And then that’s what I’ve seen in… We don’t have all of our numbers in, of course. We have it through November, but we won’t get them through December for another couple of weeks. But yeah, it was just a good steady year, year over year.
Chris Kelly: Right. And the biggest difference that we’ve actually already seen, we have some preliminary numbers in from December. And there really was difference between December of 2019 versus December of 2018. The fourth quarter of 2018, we really did kind of limp into the new year.
Mary Beth: I would agree with you.
Chris Kelly: And what we saw actually in December overall as a company in 2019 was December actually, we did better than even November did. And to me, that’s always a great sigh when people are already kind of getting busy heading into the next year. And it’s not one of those things where we’re just kind of limping into the finish line.
Mary Beth: Yeah. And we were the same way. We were busy all through the holidays. At some point, I thought, “Is anyone going to stop and celebrate?”
Chris Kelly: Yeah, yeah.
Mary Beth: “Are we going to take a day off here? Are we just going to keep on going.”
Chris Kelly: Absolutely.
Mary Beth: But yeah, the day before Christmas, the day after Christmas. I mean, it really was the showings on houses, everything. You could just see it just churning.
Chris Kelly: Right.
Mary Beth: And we usually don’t see that til about mid January, but it’s just kind of continuing.
Chris Kelly: Yeah. And I… And we were very fortunate. We’ve had some really great weather here in December and that inspires people to get out and about. But that’s encouraging. Does it… Is it an absolute predictor for the year? No, but looking back at 2018, it did take several months into 2019 before things ramped up versus this year, it’s gotten there a little quicker. So hopefully that will be sustainable.
Mary Beth: Yeah, I agree with you. And it seems to be that way through all price ranges.
Chris Kelly: Right.
Mary Beth: The higher end price range is moving along now. Those months on market have come down dramatically. It’s now, what, down to, I think, five or six months on the market for that million dollars and more.
Chris Kelly: Right.
Mary Beth: And that had been way up there.
Chris Kelly: Yeah.
Mary Beth: That was almost a year’s worth of inventory, which that’s corrected itself. And of course, anything from 400 and below is rocking right now.
Chris Kelly: Yeah, it’s rocking and tight as far as the number of buyers that we have because of the growth we’re experiencing, especially in North Texas with buyers looking for that price point and then what’s available. I would always encourage people that are in thinking like, “Should I sell my house?” If you’re in that 450 to 400 below,-
Mary Beth: Seriously, yeah.
Chris Kelly: … you’re not going to have that much difficulty doing so.
Mary Beth: No, I would agree with you. And the relocation is booming. That’s also a crazy number to me is, all the companies that are moving into our area. And I say that the metroplex as a whole is pretty staggering still.
Chris Kelly: Yeah. When we look at our numbers, I mean obviously, you look at some years with relocation, it’s always better. Instead of looking at just one year, look at a three to five year trend, because you’ll say, “Oh, we’re down from prior year.” But then you look, “Well, what was prior year? Oh. Well, Toyota moved here.”
Mary Beth: Exactly. State Farm-
Chris Kelly: “Well, what was the prior year? State Farm. Oh, McKesson moved here.” And so you want to look at it in a range and yes, what we’re seeing is yes, we didn’t have a giant, one giant relocation move in 2019. But there was still all that steady growth coming from companies that were continuing to expand to their existing numbers here in our state.
Mary Beth: Right.
Chris Kelly: And then you saw something like Uber who’s going to add 3 to 500 jobs here. And so it is continuing to happen. We are an attractor for business, that’s for sure.
Mary Beth: And interestingly enough, they’re going all over the city. It’s not like they’re necessarily all going North.
Chris Kelly: Correct.
Mary Beth: They’re first coming South and down into the downtown area.
Chris Kelly: Yeah.
Mary Beth: And so it’s a pretty good circle around the city. I think what people don’t think about too is when a major company comes, all those little ancillary people to help them, the printer, it’s like, “Well, if you’re going, I’m going.”
Chris Kelly: Yes.
Mary Beth: And so we get the little companies that come in along with that big company, so it’s not just a kind of a ripple effect. You throw one stone in there. “Oh, I’m coming. Well, I’m coming.”
Chris Kelly: Yeah. Well, because it’s the whole, it takes a village, right? I mean, it takes a village to run a company.
Mary Beth: Right.
Chris Kelly: It’s the company itself and then there’s all those ancillary services that support it.
Mary Beth: Right.
Chris Kelly: For sure.
Mary Beth: So I think 2020 and my crystal balls looking good, I think it’s going to be just a good steady year, all things aside with the election.
Chris Kelly: Right.
Mary Beth: All of that that goes on in 2020, that’ll remain to be seen.
Chris Kelly: Yeah.
Mary Beth: Let’s talk about that again in six months.
Chris Kelly: Yeah, and I agree. I agree. I mean I think from all of the forecasts that I have read from Lawrence Yoon from National Associates Realtors and others is that I think 2020 will be very similar to 2019.
Mary Beth: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Chris Kelly: You’re going to see some growth in average sales price. You’re going to see some growth in the number of listings. We are going to see a little bit growth in the average days on market, which is not necessarily again a bad thing because I was… I think maybe you and I have even chatted about that. If you go back to the superheated markets, talk to the buyers and ask them if they enjoyed it.
Mary Beth: Yes.
Chris Kelly: I mean, buyers would like an opportunity to look at a house, think about it overnight-
Mary Beth: Exactly.
Chris Kelly: … and then make an offer. And so having… Our months of inventory have gone from 3.1 to 3.7, that’s not necessarily a bad thing at all.
Mary Beth: No. And anything under six months is a very healthy market.
Chris Kelly: Correct.
Mary Beth: So that’s three months on market is really fair. And I’m seeing that as I go and talk to sellers, that days on market are definitely more into the 60s, 75s without a doubt.
Chris Kelly: Right.
Mary Beth: Through all the areas that I go to. So yeah, I’m seeing the same thing.
Chris Kelly: Yeah.
Mary Beth: So… But I’m optimistic about 2020.
Chris Kelly: I am, too. I’m always, yes, always.
Mary Beth: Yeah.
Chris Kelly: Yeah. And then I think what we’ve seen, like I said, we’ll watch it as it goes through the years. Sometimes in past election years, had been September, people start, “Should I do this? Should I do that?” And if you really would ask people look back to last elections and you said it before, “Did anything happen from the election in November or the end of the year that would have impacted any decision that you would’ve made in buying a house or not?”
Mary Beth: You were elected president and nothing.
Chris Kelly: Yeah.
Mary Beth: And so…
Chris Kelly: Right.
Mary Beth: It’s like nothing’s going to happen.
Chris Kelly: Yeah.
Mary Beth: Just in two seconds. Interest rates are still way low and I don’t see that changing until maybe mid year, fourth quarter. I don’t know. That’s what I’m hearing anyway.
Chris Kelly: Yes.
Mary Beth: Remained as me seeing about that, too. But there’s still… It’s just a good place to be. Dallas is a good place to be.
Chris Kelly: Well, yeah. Because even when you have those different things happening in the market or politics or whatever, being in Texas and the North Texas specifically, we are oftentimes insulated to some degree from those just because of the economy, which has been created here.
Mary Beth: Yeah. And it’s a good diverse economy now.
Chris Kelly: Yeah.
Mary Beth: So we don’t even have to worry about one thing going bad or another because it’s so diverse.
Chris Kelly: Correct.
Mary Beth: Nothing’s going to particularly just sink the city, which it has in the past. So, well, we’ll have to look ahead and see how predictable everything works. So we-
Chris Kelly: That’s right. We’ll see. We’ll look back. Yeah.
Mary Beth: Will we be back in six months?
Chris Kelly: And if we’re wrong, we’ll just erase this video.
Mary Beth: Oh, that’s right. We’ll just get rid of the video. It’s not a problem. Well, thanks for listening. We’re on all social media. We go where you go and thanks for listening.