At eXpcon in Salt Lake City, AGNT, Inc. Chief Executive Officer Leo Pareja told agents that the biggest industry correction has “already happened.”
“The collapse already happened three years ago,” Pareja said. “It happened in the transaction count. Two record-breaking booms warped our expectations. They stole tomorrow’s buyers with low interest rates and a frenzy that we’re just sitting through the hangover of.”
Pareja pointed to the stagnation of home sales, which have hovered around 4 million annually since 2023, and offered a cautious outlook, saying that mortgage rates and the economy could hold sales near current levels or push them below 4 million for the first time since 1995.
“Whether it’s 3.9 or 4.1, life events drive all real estate decisions,” Pareja said. “It will force people to move no matter what.”
Pareja did not buy into the broader “price crash” that many real estate professionals are warning about, instead pointing to the “unusual years” of the Great Recession and COVID-19, when the Fed cut 30-year mortgage rates to zero, as an “anomaly” that many have anchored reality to. Traditionally, he said mortgage rates have averaged 7.7% since 1971, which today’s rates are below.
“The last 20 years were so crazy that we forgot what normal looks like,” Pareja said. “We could see a rate with an 8 in front of it way before we see one with a five.”
The company stated that more homeowners now hold mortgages above 6% than below 3%, and urged agents to stop waiting for change.
“We don’t get paid to fill out contracts,” Pareja said. “We don’t get paid to coordinate parties. We get paid to help people navigate one of the most important financial decisions of their lives.”
