After a three-month deep dive into Micro-Wins to Millions, Kevin Clayson and Steve Earl return with their first live episode of 2026—and they start with a big-picture forecast. Using Redfin’s newly released 2026 Housing Predictions as a framework, Kevin and Steve break down why the housing market is entering a “Great Reset”—not a crash, not a boom, but a slow, meaningful recalibration that favors prepared investors. They discuss why interest rates dipping into the low 6% range matter less for monthly payments and more for buyer psychology, how affordability will improve as wage growth outpaces home price growth, and why pent-up demand hasn’t disappeared—it’s just been waiting on the sidelines. The conversation also tackles declining transaction volume over the last three years, what that slowdown actually signals, and why investors who continued buying during uncertainty are already benefiting from appreciation, tax advantages, and refinancing opportunities. Finally, Kevin and Steve explain why rising rents, shifting political pressure around affordability, and changing incentives for sellers all point to one conclusion: the window of opportunity is open—but it won’t stay open forever. This episode is a grounded, data-backed reminder that the cost of waiting is real—and that steady, strategic action still wins in real estate.
Kevin Clayson (00:02.829) All right, well, welcome back to the Moneyball Real Estate Show with Kevin and... Hey, man. Buddy, it has been a minute since we've been recording live like this and having a real-time conversation because I felt like it was so important for everybody to be able to consume micro-wins to millions and to be able to just... Steve (00:09.678) Steve, how's it going today, Kev? Kevin Clayson (00:28.191) dive into that thing. And so as you well know, we've been releasing a chapter a week for the last three months just because I wanted them all put together, right? I wanted it to make it easy for people to go and find them. And so now we are back with our first official live podcast of 2026. And it feels good to be back at it, man. Steve (00:51.586) Yeah, it's actually been really fun for me to, you know, to, to re-listen to the book that we wrote just a couple of years ago and to revisit those, all those things. And it's funny, like over the last, you know, couple of months as we've been doing this every, I don't know, a couple of times a week, you've been sending me text messages early in the morning when you've been listening to it while you're working out. You're just like, dude, like, like this book is really good. I'm like, I know that. Do you know who wrote it? Kevin Clayson (01:15.937) Well, it's funny because like, look, you know, we wrote and rewrote that book so many times, right? And just because I'm sort of a perfectionist in that way and I, you know, were, you, the content was always good, but I just, I'm weird when I'm writing and I'm like, I want to change it, I want to change it. And so you go through so many iterations and then yes, we also read the audio book, but then there's something, different about like kind of listening to it, not as me like reading it, but as me or writing it, but me is trying to like separate myself from it and listen to it as if I'm just sort of an observer, you know, a consumer of the content. And it was, it was true. whenever the podcast would drop and this is going to sound probably completely egotistical, I like to listen to our podcast. Like I like to listen to it. with the ears of hopefully everybody out there listening, not just like I remember when I said that, but it's like, I want to hear it. Like I'm listening to a different real estate podcast to go, is this making sense? And so I listened to all of the chapters and I would be on the treadmill or, you know, on the elliptical or lifting weights or something. And I'd finish a chapter and I'd text you, I'd be like, dude, is this so good? Cause it is. It's like the content we poured so much into that book and it's, I'm proud of it. It's really good. I like it. Steve (02:37.804) Yeah, and it is, it's really like I say, I had fun re-listening to it and listening to it with fresh eyes. And when it's been a while, a minute since we finished writing it and to like try and hear it from the perspective of just an investor or somebody hearing it for the first time and that kind of a thing. so it was, was really, it was refreshing, it was fun and it was a good exercise. And I'm super excited to jump back, you know, on the podcast live with you and to discuss some of the different topics that are really important. And I think, I think this is going to be a really exciting year in real estate, Kev. Like the last three years have been really, I mean, they've been, I'll call it like very calm years. Like there's, just not a ton happening on the real estate front. Things have been kind of static for a long period of time. They kind of slowed down. They hit kind of different levels than they have in the past. And the talk about real estate and real estate investing has just been a little bit subdued. But there are some really interesting things happening on the political front and in the investment space, all the way from the big hedge funds and what they can and can't do to what different predictions are. there's like new products have come out. It's interesting that like necessity is the mother of all invention. And over the last three years for real estate investors, know, the market's been just a little bit slower. So it's been a lot of like hurry up and wait. But those in the industry, both on the real estate side and all of the ancillary services have been like working feverishly. Kevin Clayson (04:10.113) Mm-hmm. Kevin Clayson (04:19.072) Yeah. Steve (04:29.966) at developing new products, new opportunities, new ways of looking at real estate, new ways of financing real estate, new ways of managing real estate, new ways of looking at it in terms of strategy and so on. And so I'm excited to kind of just talk today. I think we're going to review some ideas of what's going to be happening this next year in 2026. Is that right? Kevin Clayson (04:48.725) Yeah, we love to do kind of, we've done this for a couple years now where we just kind of do like a forecast, right? It's like, hey, what's coming, what's coming down, you know, what's coming down the pike? And there's this article that was emailed to me and it was from Redfin and Redfin as people know, they're a massive company, massive data company. You can go and look up your home values there. It's kind of like a Zillow, right? Zillow and Redfin are kind of like the two big names in sort of prop tech. especially when it comes to finding homes. And I mean, it's just crazy. And they put out an article called Redfin's 2026 Predictions. And the title of the article, and we're actually gonna title this episode the same thing, Welcome to the Great Housing Reset. Now that, and I don't know how you feel about that phrase, but it's kind of interesting to me. What I love about the idea of a reset is this is gonna be, I do think that it is a housing reset. And you just alluded to that a second ago when you said, that, what'd you say, something's a necessity of all invention? Necessity, that's right. And we necessarily have had to adjust given what the market's been doing, right? I mean, if you look at the last couple of years, Steve and I have held to the idea that it is always the right time to buy and we've been proven right, but it's been hard for people to buy because they're like, well, interest rates are high or, you know, Steve (05:51.479) Necessity is the mother of all invention. Kevin Clayson (06:15.009) It's funny, I'm doing game plan reviews with all of our clients now, and I look at some of the folks that were smart and took action and bought when interest rates were in the mid 7%. That's when most people were going, there's no way I'm buying real estate right now. The interest rate is way too high. And now we're able to go back and do refinances on those interest rates and get the payments down. But when you look at even a slowly growing appreciation market, You look at what the properties have represented to our clients that took action when interest rates were high. They have still increased their net worth by tens of thousands of dollars, not to mention cashflow, not to mention tax benefits, all while everybody else sat on the sideline and missed the opportunity to get good deals. And the good thing is right now we are still seeing, I'm looking at properties all the time. And I still see on a very regular basis that sellers are extremely willing to come to the market or to come to the table. And I don't know how much longer that's going to last because of this great housing reset, because there is a recalibration. There are some things that are changing. It's different than when we had the big mortgage crisis and the whole Dodd-Frank legislation and that landscape shifted because it had been. wildly skewed and probably not in a positive way. What's interesting is now the pendulum swung and everything constricted and contracted so much that now we're trying to go, okay, well, how do we open this up? How do we improve affordability? How do we make it easier for investors and easier for primary residence owners to be able to buy and own real estate? And how do we get incentives in front of people so that they won't sit on the sideline? This is a different kind of housing reset. And this article from Redfin, I'll just read you the first couple sentences, because I think it sets up this conversation perfectly. Here's what it says. It says, well, there's a section right at the top that's just kind of in italics. And it says, US home buyers will start to get some relief in 2026 with affordability improving. Kevin Clayson (08:35.297) as income growth outpaces home price growth. And then it says next year, meaning this came out right at the end of 2025. So this year, 2026 will mark the beginning of a long, slow recovery for the housing market. And I think that's really what we're seeing is there is changes that are happening. They are going to happen slowly and we are going to be the beneficiaries of. all of the good stuff and the changes that are coming if we're in the game. Steve (09:09.024) Yeah. And, Kev, like what this prediction does is, is it aligns very closely with our entire strategy. We're just talking about the book of micro wins to millions. And our, our strategy is exactly this. is a slow growth strategy, but it is slow and it is steady and it is predictable. And that's what I feel like, Redfin has done a great job of outlining with this first prediction. that it's going to be just a good steady long term growth. the different policies that are being implemented, I think are going to lead to just that, which is the healthy way to approach real estate and real estate investing. And maybe even more importantly than that to the overall, know, healthiness of the real estate economy in terms of affordability, people getting being able to get into homes, afford homes, live in homes as opposed to like being, you know, forever renters. Kevin Clayson (10:15.787) Yeah, and I just wanted to just mention this because since it's the first time we've been back live. Guys, there's a couple updates to the website and it lends itself to this conversation. So if you guys go to dfy-realestate.com, you'll see some new colors. This is kind of the new era for us as well. This is kind of like the DFY real estate reset to a certain extent. But there's a couple things. Right now, if you go to the homepage, there's two buttons, right? You could start a conversation with us and we can book some time. Or you can, there's a button that says learn more. That will take you to a page that we have built and dedicated to Micro Wins to Millions. It allows you to share the book with anybody and everybody that you want to. If there's anybody in your life that is talking about real estate, thinking about real estate, curious about real estate, it lets you share the book as an audio, share the book as a digital book, share the video book. We've got the entire video book. I just made it public on YouTube all seven hours. of the audio book, me and Steve reading the audio book. We just did a video book because why not? Some people like to watch like my kid will go to the gym and Braxton, he'll be like, Dad, because we have screen time limits on his phone. And I'll be like, Dad, can you give me some more time for YouTube? I was like, dude, we're lifting weights. What do you need YouTube for? He's like, well, that's where I listen to my music. I was like, that's what iTunes is for, man. But some people just prefer to listen through YouTube. And so that's why the video book. is there so you can consume the book and share the book. You can get all the podcast episodes. The other thing that I just wanted to point out that I think is interesting and lends itself to this conversation is we now have updated transaction reports on the website as well. you, like, I don't know, do you guys realize you can go onto dfy-realestate.com and there's a link at the top that says client success. You can go look at reports for the last 12 years from 2013 through 2025 of every single real estate transaction that Dunphy Real Estate has facilitated for its clients. Every single one. You can see the total volume. We don't do full addresses, but I just wanted to share this with everybody because we're talking about what's been the impact on the market and what does the reset look like? Well, Steve and I believe that this year things are going to open up quite significantly. And we'll go through a couple key predictions that we share with Redfin as to why the market's going to ease up. Kevin Clayson (12:39.841) but just to give everybody an idea, all right? So if you wanna know how much real estate we helped our clients transact in 2022, you can go and get this on the website. The total, do you know what the total was, Steve, in 2022? Steve (12:54.452) Not off the top of my head, like I think, yeah. Kevin Clayson (12:57.345) just under $78 million. Okay, just under 78 million in 2022. If you go look at 2023, 23 was just under 40 million. Okay, so took a little bit of a dip. You go look at 24, okay. 24 is, hold on, tell ya. 24 is, oh come on. When it pulls up, I'll give it to ya. Kevin Clayson (13:30.241) 2024 was more than 2023, okay? It was about 41 million. And then 2025, because this is really what we're talking about, and why I think we are primed for a housing reset and a recovery. If you look at 2025, the full amount in 2025 that we transacted with our clients was right around 25 million. So we went from 80, played around at 40. and then down to 25. Now here's what that indicates to me. That indicates only one thing, which is less people. And that is not just us, Steve. You know very well. The real estate market in general saw, if we saw a, you know, what we went from 40 down to 25%, you're the math guy, Steve. What is that percentage and decrease in volume? Steve (14:19.31) That's about 50. Oh, from 40 to 25. It's about 35 38%. Kevin Clayson (14:23.359) Yeah, it's like, yeah, 35%. The industry dumped like 70 % like a total transaction volume, right? Isn't that, wasn't that the number? was like, I mean, it was massive. So it goes to show that the people that understand real estate will continue to buy and that's who you guys are. That's why you listen to the podcast. But what I think is interesting about that is the reason everything came to a grinding halt, not even a grinding halt, but just slowed down significantly. is because people got scared, people were worried about interest rates, people wanted to stay on the sidelines, people were seeing, what if rents aren't climbing the way I want them to? What if home prices aren't increasing the way we want them to? And all of that, I think we are going to see a reversal of in 2026. And that is not what Steve and I think, it is what we think, but it's also what Redfin thinks. And that kind of leads us in to the main predictions that we're gonna share with you. for the great housing reset of 2026. So Steve, I'm gonna read this first one to you and I wanna get your reaction. So their prediction, which we have already seen come to fruition really is prediction number one, mortgage rates will dip to low 6 % range, which will help to increase affordability. Steve (15:43.821) Yeah, so what's interesting is that that's already happened. mean, interest rates actually dipped below six. They hit 5.99 this last week. They'll probably come back up slightly. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And so it's happening on the interest rate side of things. people are noticing, they're seeing, because, Kev, we've been talking about what I'm gonna say next here for the last three years is that Kevin Clayson (15:53.857) And that's without rate by downs. Yeah. Steve (16:14.286) real estate volume across the board, because I'll share one stat really quick, for just the general industry, for real estate agents nationwide, of the five million plus real estate agents that have been in the industry over the years, NAR provided a statistic that said, I think it was 74 % of all real estate agents did zero transactions. That's how low the volume is. So with that, point that I'm making is that with the dip in interest rates, people are already recognizing and seeing that and looking to jump back in. And the reason why I think Redfin feels pretty confident in saying that there's going to be a significant reset is that the demand, Kev, did not go away. Like it's still there. Like we still, like this country, Kevin Clayson (17:09.919) Yeah, right. Steve (17:13.986) has a shortage of affordable housing to the tune of five plus million homes. And people just haven't been buying because they haven't been able to, or they've been too scared, or the myriad of reasons that we've talked about, the demand is still there. And so when all of the different factors line up, we're going to see a bit of I think we're gonna see a bit of a rush. And that's what this, I think part of the reset is, there's gonna be this slow gradual improvement. I agree that it's going to be slow and gradual, but I can kind of see there's going to be kind of like this like initial like bump where it goes, you know, on a scale of one to a hundred, we'll probably see like this bump of like immediately like bam, like 10, 10%. And then it will kind of gradually go, go from there as like this initial, like the people who are like just literally like they, they've been like preparing and waiting, make sure their credit's good, looking for those jobs, you know. promotion opportunities and then just waiting on the sidelines. And it's kind of like the minute like once you get past this threshold and interest rates get to here like bam, they're in the market. so I think there'll be an initial bit of a rush and then there'll be the slow gradual improvement and the demand has been there and it's just waiting to start being let loose. Kevin Clayson (18:22.964) Yeah. Kevin Clayson (18:38.932) Well, and just to kind of comment on this for anybody listening, when we say that mortgage rates will dip, understand that it's not going to be so significant. So for us, those of us that are investors that are in the market, the interest rate decrease is not going to be something that will be a hundreds of dollars a month difference. It's not gonna be a massive difference in term of payment between what I could go. buy a home for today and what I could maybe in six months time. The difference is this. As soon as the world wakes up to two facts, number one, interest rates are decreasing, and number two, they're not gonna get much lower than they are right now, but they are gonna get a little bit lower. Everybody's gonna go, well, I guess why wait any longer? We better jump in the market. As soon as people feel the slightest bit of confidence, what they will do is they will jump into the market, which they're gonna be gobbling up some of that inventory. Steve already told you, there's still a shortage of affordable housing. If people enter the market, all these people that have been on the sideline, as soon as they enter the market and they start to gobble up some of that inventory, what's going to happen is it's going to teach sellers that buyers wanna buy, which is what's going to increase prices because sellers are gonna feel like they can get a little bit more. Well, if sellers are increasing prices, that means you're buying at higher prices, which means the quicker you buy, the quicker you benefit from the appreciation that you're gonna see as a result of interest rates. Now, here's, and let me just point this out. So if you look at the average 30-year fixed interest rate in 2020, okay, was, now this is across all 30-year fixed rates. So this is. the average investment primary, the vast majority of them are gonna be primary residences. The average interest rate in 2020 was 3.1%. The average interest rate in 2021 was 3.0%. In 2022, it jumped to 5.3. And then those two years, so you look at the years where it, like our volume and the industry in general, they were at Kevin Clayson (20:59.188) seven to six and a half to 7 % in 23 and 24 and 25. So the prediction is that interest rates are gonna be in the low sixes and we've already seen low sixes and high fives. And so even with a new Fed chair coming in, I know that Trump's gonna be placing some pressure on lowering the interest rate. Just as a reminder to everybody, if the Fed lowers the interest rate, that does not necessarily mean that mortgage interest rates are gonna look. lower, it's not a direct correlation. They're lowering the rate of the overnight Fed lending rate, which if that boosts market confidence, that's what makes lenders say, know, really the bonds and yields are gonna react to that, which is what's gonna react to mortgage interest rates as you have people getting a little bit more excited about getting into the market. So yes, interest rates are gonna come down. but the impact is not gonna be on your payment, the impact is gonna be on the market deciding it's time to reenter and you wanna be on the right side of that, that kind of bum rush on the market, because then you get to take advantage of all the upside as everybody decides that they wanna rejoin the fray, right? Steve (22:16.206) Yeah, exactly. And it's interesting to just really quick note that we saw the very reverse. So right now, rates have slowly been coming down and there's a magic number. And I don't know if it's this collective consciousness where all of a sudden everybody goes, oh, and they start jumping in. It was the same thing when interest rates were going up. We could see it in 2022. As interest rates started to climb in 2022, we saw volume began to decrease slowly, slowly. But once we hit, there was a magic number. I don't remember, Kev, exactly what it was, but it was seven points something on the interest rate in Q4 of 2022. And it was like, turned the light switch off and everybody said, that's the magic number. I'm not buying anymore. And that's when the market just kind of like got stuck. And so the reverse is what you just described. Kevin Clayson (23:04.053) Right. Right. We're not doing it. Kevin Clayson (23:11.777) Yeah, it's really, really interesting. Yeah, exactly. And here's the other thing. You said you don't know if it's sort of the collective mindset. I think it is. I studied political science in college, and that's really just the science of how people act, interact in a variety of different conditions. And there is a herd mentality that... absolutely exists, groupthink is a thing. And if you hear on the news that people are buying, if there's enough articles that say, home purchases have increased, what will happen is the herd mentality will kick in, everybody will feel like they are missing out. If they're hearing that people are buying and they are not buying, they're gonna be like, my gosh, I'm missing it. That's how they're gonna jump in. And so all of this will lend itself to a gradual, increase in home buying largely because the group think the herd mentality is, interest rates are getting to a reasonable level. And they are at a level right now where you can cash flow. It's not a lot, okay? But you can still see some positive cash flow, even though now is not a cash flow market, right? Unless you're putting more down. But it's at least to the point where, you you can see some positive, you know, action in that way. All right, so that's prediction number one, right? Interest rates. Here's prediction number two. Home buying affordability will improve as wages grow faster than prices. Now, this one is also sort of a wages are gonna increase and that's gonna have an impact on the market. So it's not the market specifically, it's that the projected wage increase in 2026 is, I'm seeing if there's a percentage, I know I've heard it, but I can't remember what they're anticipating it to be, let's see. They're just saying we expect the median home sale price to rise 1 % year over year in 2026. So prices will tick up marginally. And if you look at the markets that we're in and the homes that we're seeing, that we're seeing on average, that or better, 3 % is probably pretty close to what we're seeing across markets with some markets doing better than others. And all of that being because as the financial world starts to open up a little bit, Kevin Clayson (25:33.569) We're gonna see people feeling a little bit more confident. I'm making a little bit more money. I feel like I'm good with my employment. I'm seeing the interest rates have come down a little bit. I'm hearing that everybody else is maybe jumping into the market. All of that says, okay, I'm entering the market. And with that, because they feel like it's more affordable, we're gonna see those prices increase. Anything you want to add to that one? Steve (25:58.819) Yeah, no, I actually think that they're spot on with this. so the thing to keep in mind, and you kind of alluded to this, is that's 1 % across the country, right? So that's an increased average across the board. So in some markets, you're gonna see higher than 1%. In other markets, you're gonna see lower than 1%. The markets where we buy, you know, have been buying in recently Oklahoma, Indiana, Texas. They've been seeing slight increases even during, you the last couple of years. It's been, you know, flatter than normal, but it's been, you know, the 1 % are higher. And so this coming year in certain markets, we'll definitely see higher than 1%, which is a great start to this reset. Kevin Clayson (26:54.113) Well, and if you, so what they're anticipating is that home sales, this is prediction number three, home sales are gonna rise 3%. So they're predicting that the sale of existing homes in 2026 will be 3 % better than it was in 2025. So that's not prices, that's volume. But what's interesting, I read our transaction volume numbers earlier. If you look at the number of existing homes sold and kind of adjusted for, each year and whatever interest rates were doing, it was like five and a half or so million homes is what they're, so this is from NAR. It's 5.6 million homes sold in 2020. 6.1 million homes sold in 2021. 5 million homes in 2022. And then it dipped down to between three and four million homes. in 23, 24 and 25. And then they're anticipating we're gonna be up between four and 5 % again, or four and 5 million again, at least according to their data. And so again, we're noticing the trend, right? Interest rates were low, volume was up, consumer confidence was high. Interest rates increased, volume decreases, consumer confidence lowers. So now if consumer confidence increases and interest rates come down, it will have a net impact of more people buying and that's gonna have an impact on home prices increasing. So the trends that we've seen over the last 10 years are just being repeated except in the inverse now. And so that's why we felt totally confident in saying, we agree with these predictions just because we've tracked this and watched this for so long that we feel like we feel really confident that we know where it's going. which is why we're constantly advocating that you want to be on the right side of the coin as the as the market starts to ease up and improve. Steve (28:54.274) Yep. So jumping into prediction four, this is an interesting one. This has been kind of this a real dilemma. I don't know if dilemma is the right word, just it's been a real anomaly is rent. So prediction four is that rents will rise as demand for apartments rises and supply falls. And, you know, over the last three years, I mean, during COVID and slightly post COVID, like rent demand was through the roof and rent prices were increasing at in some cases double digits, but certainly seven to 9 % in many areas and higher and even higher in other areas. And then over the last three years there was actually a decrease in rent prices and that was. That was a hard one to truly understand what was going on because if people aren't buying homes, then they're going to have to rent, which would make you think that rents would go up because more people are renting as opposed to buying. But the reverse happened. And so the question became in my mind, well, so where are people living then? And the best explanation I could come up with and that I researched and found some substantiation for this theory is that many people moved back in with parents, they were doubling up with roommates in an effort to lower costs and to just wait out the current economic situation and to prepare to be able to buy. And so what the prediction is here is that as people begin buying and owning more single-family residential, That will put a crunch on supply for rentals. There won't be as many rentals because people are buying them up as primaries. And that will increase demand, or not demand, will decrease the supply, which will increase the demand for renters, which will put upward pressure on rent prices. And so they're expecting the prediction Steve (31:17.87) is that rents, they're predicting that rents will rise two to 3 % year over year by the end of 2026, roughly at the pace of inflation. Does all that make sense? Can you have the way I explained it? Kevin Clayson (31:28.309) Yeah, no, yeah, 100%. And just in terms of real time data, know, as we talk to specialized property management, I could tell you that their days on market are better than national averages. And the days on market have started to improve as far as how long homes are staying on the market. You know, they're still, you know, like, it's not like homes are renting in one day, right? They're taking a month or two. And we find that if you're competitive in pricing, you can rent the properties pretty quickly. So there is still a competitive market in the rental world right now. So you have to price it competitively and you've got to give it some time. But we are seeing that days on market is decreasing and we are seeing that rent amounts are slowly increasing already. And so, cause we were seeing that for a while in order to get homes released or re-rented as clients had one tenant that was moving out in order to release it, they were having to lower rent from what it had been. And so that's kind of where that competitive pricing comes in. If you're buying, know, the pricing should be right where it needs to be to get it to move and to get you, you know, right where you got to be. But so we are seeing in real time already at the beginning of, you know, mid January here that we are already seeing some of this take effect. so, again, we want to when on the right side of the growth curve. Right. And that is right now before things start to ease up, before things start to improve. Now, this is the last one. There's a couple other predictions that I don't think are super relevant to us as investors here. But this one, I think, is relevant to us. It's just kind of interesting. the prediction that Redfin gave is that political parties are going to kind of unite. Policymakers are going to say, all right, We have an affordability crisis. We all want to be reelected. So we've got to find a way to work together to make the affordability improve. And so I think that means both sides of the aisle are going to say, well, maybe we're a little bit more willing to come to the table because if our constituents are happy, they're likely to vote us back. And so as an act of this is not selfless actions by our politicians. It is completely self-serving. Kevin Clayson (33:55.532) preservation, which can be really powerful motivator. if they are trying to preserve their seat, they may be more willing to come to the table to increase and improve affordability for Americans across the board with everybody hoping that they're going to win re-election. And I think that there's truth to that. I think that as we go into the midterms this year, I think that you're gonna see more and more people that, you you're already hearing a lot of stuff from Trump right now on affordability, affordability, affordability. I don't know if it's bipartisan yet. You know, we announced something on healthcare. He's announced this credit card thing that he wants to try to do. I mean, he's been making some inroads into affordability. And I think everybody's gonna kind of come along that same path. And all that's gonna mean is that they can improve affordability, okay? Again, remember to what, and we're gonna wrap with this. Remember what we were talking about earlier. while affordability will be felt by you and I to a certain extent, right? We're already seeing it in gas prices and if gas stays low, know, some of our cost of goods should, you know, even out a little bit, you know, as we're going to the store, it's really hard to lower prices once you raise them. But nonetheless, if everybody's feeling that their wallets are a little bit heavier than they were, and if the policymakers are doing things to make us feel confident, that confidence will translate to people jumping off of the sidelines and back into the market. And as they jump back into the market, that's when we're gonna see, you know, prices increase, rents increase. And if we are currently owning, we get to be the beneficiaries of all that. And so that's really, think, you know, if we look at the great housing reset, long story short, things should improve this year. As things improve, more people are gonna buy. As more people buy, if you own the real estate, you're gonna get to take advantage of the upside. And so like always, if you are considering anything in 2026, I'm telling you, don't wait. Sellers are willing to boogie right now, okay? We are seeing this, we are seeing price cuts, we are seeing seller paid concessions. We already know that some of the builders are starting to pull back some of the incentives that they've been. Kevin Clayson (36:11.537) offering to attract buyers. So if they're pulling back incentives, that tells you the temperature in the market is shifting. And so knowing that now is absolutely the time to take advantage of the best possible opportunities that you're going to have available to you here in 2026. In this first quarter is the time to, you're doing anything, give me a call, reach out to us. If you want to run some numbers, if you want to look at your game plan, if you want to just get a little bit more individual information. Do not hesitate to reach out, because I don't want you to miss a window. And it's always a good time to buy. But right now, you are on the side of the coin where you stand to benefit a lot in 2026 and moving forward, if you're jumping off the sidelines and not being fearful like everybody else and diving in and getting some things done. So that's kind of the last thought I had, Steve. Any last thoughts as we wrap the episode? Steve (37:03.5) Yeah, the thing I'll end with is, The political will right now is definitely in favor of making housing affordable. And they're approaching it from as many angles as they can, not just building less expensive type homes or more dense housing and that kind of thing. But they're approaching it from, we need to figure out wages. We need to figure out interest rates. We need to figure out all of these different things. if anything that I've learned over the years is I've kind of watched how politics affects things, is that they tend to swing the pendulum in the direction that they want things to go to the extreme. And so this economic pendulum swings back and forth all the time, right? And there's only very short moments of equilibrium where the pendulum is kind of in the middle. It's typically either to one way or to the other. And so as they're pushing and pulling and prying this pendulum back over to this other side to get the housing market going again, it's a likely but not guaranteed scenario that the pendulum is going to swing dramatically to the other end again. And then there's gonna be another correction that will pull it back. And so I think what I hear you saying, Kev, is like, you know, It's this idea that we have lived by for a long time, which is Warren Buffett's philosophy and thought process is that you buy when people are fearful and you sell when people are greedy. And right now, everybody is super fearful and the pendulum is about to swing to where that pendulum is gonna be in a position where now everybody, like you mentioned, the herd mentality, Steve (39:00.462) people are gonna jump on and that's gonna swing it even further. And it's when you are able to kind of jump in and take advantage of that swing before it hits disequilibrium at the other end of the spectrum that you can really take advantage. Now, having said that, the beautiful thing about real estate is that pendulum swings fairly slowly. And our philosophy is one of long-term. And so, we've owned the same properties and we've been working with the same clients as that pendulum has swung back and forth like multiple times now. And so the beautiful thing about investing the way that we do is that you don't have to time it perfectly, but there's nothing wrong with trying to get some timing in. It's like, because the benefit will be a little bit better or a lot better and it will take less time. I mean, but over time, you're going to win either way. But there's, like I say, there's nothing wrong with trying to see the signs and make good, you know, good and calculated and wise decisions in terms of, hey, it's like, I have been waiting on the sidelines. I have been waiting. And it looks like maybe this might be the time to jump. And our, I guess our calculation is, I mean, if you didn't jump in a year ago or two years ago, there's still that opportunity before that pendulum swings dramatically to get some of the immediate, not immediate, but more immediate benefit than not. so anyways, I'll just kind of end with that thought. Kevin Clayson (40:40.149) Yeah, I love it. You know, there is a cost to doing nothing, an actual monetary cost to sitting and waiting. And that's really what we've seen. And there's a monetary benefit to acting, especially when you have the right strategy in place. And so not acting for the sake of acting, but acting with the right strategy. And that's all we're talking about. So, well, everybody, thank you for joining us for Prediction Time 2026, the great housing reset. of this next year. We hope you enjoy the pod. As always, please subscribe. Please share it with friends and family. Don't forget to go to dfy-realestate.com. You can go look at those transaction reports I was talking about. You can go and click on that learn more tab and you could get access to micro wins to millions. Please feel free to share it with anybody and everybody that you want to. And if you would give us a five star review on Apple podcasts, that would be awesome. It really helps us. We are gonna keep rolling with live episodes moving forward now week after week. We appreciate you. Thanks for tuning in and we'll talk to you next week. Steve (41:40.844) Have an amazing day.Kevin Clayson (00:02.829) All right, well, welcome back to the Moneyball Real Estate Show with Kevin and... Hey, man. Buddy, it has been a minute since we've been recording live like this and having a real-time conversation because I felt like it was so important for everybody to be able to consume micro-wins to millions and to be able to just... Steve (00:09.678) Steve, how's it going today, Kev? Kevin Clayson (00:28.191) dive into that thing. And so as you well know, we've been releasing a chapter a week for the last three months just because I wanted them all put together, right? I wanted it to make it easy for people to go and find them. And so now we are back with our first official live podcast of 2026. And it feels good to be back at it, man. Steve (00:51.586) Yeah, it's actually been really fun for me to, you know, to, to re-listen to the book that we wrote just a couple of years ago and to revisit those, all those things. And it's funny, like over the last, you know, couple of months as we've been doing this every, I don't know, a couple of times a week, you've been sending me text messages early in the morning when you've been listening to it while you're working out. You're just like, dude, like, like this book is really good. I'm like, I know that. Do you know who wrote it? Kevin Clayson (01:15.937) Well, it's funny because like, look, you know, we wrote and rewrote that book so many times, right? And just because I'm sort of a perfectionist in that way and I, you know, were, you, the content was always good, but I just, I'm weird when I'm writing and I'm like, I want to change it, I want to change it. And so you go through so many iterations and then yes, we also read the audio book, but then there's something, different about like kind of listening to it, not as me like reading it, but as me or writing it, but me is trying to like separate myself from it and listen to it as if I'm just sort of an observer, you know, a consumer of the content. And it was, it was true. whenever the podcast would drop and this is going to sound probably completely egotistical, I like to listen to our podcast. Like I like to listen to it. with the ears of hopefully everybody out there listening, not just like I remember when I said that, but it's like, I want to hear it. Like I'm listening to a different real estate podcast to go, is this making sense? And so I listened to all of the chapters and I would be on the treadmill or, you know, on the elliptical or lifting weights or something. And I'd finish a chapter and I'd text you, I'd be like, dude, is this so good? Cause it is. It's like the content we poured so much into that book and it's, I'm proud of it. It's really good. I like it. Steve (02:37.804) Yeah, and it is, it's really like I say, I had fun re-listening to it and listening to it with fresh eyes. And when it's been a while, a minute since we finished writing it and to like try and hear it from the perspective of just an investor or somebody hearing it for the first time and that kind of a thing. so it was, was really, it was refreshing, it was fun and it was a good exercise. And I'm super excited to jump back, you know, on the podcast live with you and to discuss some of the different topics that are really important. And I think, I think this is going to be a really exciting year in real estate, Kev. Like the last three years have been really, I mean, they've been, I'll call it like very calm years. Like there's, just not a ton happening on the real estate front. Things have been kind of static for a long period of time. They kind of slowed down. They hit kind of different levels than they have in the past. And the talk about real estate and real estate investing has just been a little bit subdued. But there are some really interesting things happening on the political front and in the investment space, all the way from the big hedge funds and what they can and can't do to what different predictions are. there's like new products have come out. It's interesting that like necessity is the mother of all invention. And over the last three years for real estate investors, know, the market's been just a little bit slower. So it's been a lot of like hurry up and wait. But those in the industry, both on the real estate side and all of the ancillary services have been like working feverishly. Kevin Clayson (04:10.113) Mm-hmm. Kevin Clayson (04:19.072) Yeah. Steve (04:29.966) at developing new products, new opportunities, new ways of looking at real estate, new ways of financing real estate, new ways of managing real estate, new ways of looking at it in terms of strategy and so on. And so I'm excited to kind of just talk today. I think we're going to review some ideas of what's going to be happening this next year in 2026. Is that right? Kevin Clayson (04:48.725) Yeah, we love to do kind of, we've done this for a couple years now where we just kind of do like a forecast, right? It's like, hey, what's coming, what's coming down, you know, what's coming down the pike? And there's this article that was emailed to me and it was from Redfin and Redfin as people know, they're a massive company, massive data company. You can go and look up your home values there. It's kind of like a Zillow, right? Zillow and Redfin are kind of like the two big names in sort of prop tech. especially when it comes to finding homes. And I mean, it's just crazy. And they put out an article called Redfin's 2026 Predictions. And the title of the article, and we're actually gonna title this episode the same thing, Welcome to the Great Housing Reset. Now that, and I don't know how you feel about that phrase, but it's kind of interesting to me. What I love about the idea of a reset is this is gonna be, I do think that it is a housing reset. And you just alluded to that a second ago when you said, that, what'd you say, something's a necessity of all invention? Necessity, that's right. And we necessarily have had to adjust given what the market's been doing, right? I mean, if you look at the last couple of years, Steve and I have held to the idea that it is always the right time to buy and we've been proven right, but it's been hard for people to buy because they're like, well, interest rates are high or, you know, Steve (05:51.479) Necessity is the mother of all invention. Kevin Clayson (06:15.009) It's funny, I'm doing game plan reviews with all of our clients now, and I look at some of the folks that were smart and took action and bought when interest rates were in the mid 7%. That's when most people were going, there's no way I'm buying real estate right now. The interest rate is way too high. And now we're able to go back and do refinances on those interest rates and get the payments down. But when you look at even a slowly growing appreciation market, You look at what the properties have represented to our clients that took action when interest rates were high. They have still increased their net worth by tens of thousands of dollars, not to mention cashflow, not to mention tax benefits, all while everybody else sat on the sideline and missed the opportunity to get good deals. And the good thing is right now we are still seeing, I'm looking at properties all the time. And I still see on a very regular basis that sellers are extremely willing to come to the market or to come to the table. And I don't know how much longer that's going to last because of this great housing reset, because there is a recalibration. There are some things that are changing. It's different than when we had the big mortgage crisis and the whole Dodd-Frank legislation and that landscape shifted because it had been. wildly skewed and probably not in a positive way. What's interesting is now the pendulum swung and everything constricted and contracted so much that now we're trying to go, okay, well, how do we open this up? How do we improve affordability? How do we make it easier for investors and easier for primary residence owners to be able to buy and own real estate? And how do we get incentives in front of people so that they won't sit on the sideline? This is a different kind of housing reset. And this article from Redfin, I'll just read you the first couple sentences, because I think it sets up this conversation perfectly. Here's what it says. It says, well, there's a section right at the top that's just kind of in italics. And it says, US home buyers will start to get some relief in 2026 with affordability improving. Kevin Clayson (08:35.297) as income growth outpaces home price growth. And then it says next year, meaning this came out right at the end of 2025. So this year, 2026 will mark the beginning of a long, slow recovery for the housing market. And I think that's really what we're seeing is there is changes that are happening. They are going to happen slowly and we are going to be the beneficiaries of. all of the good stuff and the changes that are coming if we're in the game. Steve (09:09.024) Yeah. And, Kev, like what this prediction does is, is it aligns very closely with our entire strategy. We're just talking about the book of micro wins to millions. And our, our strategy is exactly this. is a slow growth strategy, but it is slow and it is steady and it is predictable. And that's what I feel like, Redfin has done a great job of outlining with this first prediction. that it's going to be just a good steady long term growth. the different policies that are being implemented, I think are going to lead to just that, which is the healthy way to approach real estate and real estate investing. And maybe even more importantly than that to the overall, know, healthiness of the real estate economy in terms of affordability, people getting being able to get into homes, afford homes, live in homes as opposed to like being, you know, forever renters. Kevin Clayson (10:15.787) Yeah, and I just wanted to just mention this because since it's the first time we've been back live. Guys, there's a couple updates to the website and it lends itself to this conversation. So if you guys go to dfy-realestate.com, you'll see some new colors. This is kind of the new era for us as well. This is kind of like the DFY real estate reset to a certain extent. But there's a couple things. Right now, if you go to the homepage, there's two buttons, right? You could start a conversation with us and we can book some time. Or you can, there's a button that says learn more. That will take you to a page that we have built and dedicated to Micro Wins to Millions. It allows you to share the book with anybody and everybody that you want to. If there's anybody in your life that is talking about real estate, thinking about real estate, curious about real estate, it lets you share the book as an audio, share the book as a digital book, share the video book. We've got the entire video book. I just made it public on YouTube all seven hours. of the audio book, me and Steve reading the audio book. We just did a video book because why not? Some people like to watch like my kid will go to the gym and Braxton, he'll be like, Dad, because we have screen time limits on his phone. And I'll be like, Dad, can you give me some more time for YouTube? I was like, dude, we're lifting weights. What do you need YouTube for? He's like, well, that's where I listen to my music. I was like, that's what iTunes is for, man. But some people just prefer to listen through YouTube. And so that's why the video book. is there so you can consume the book and share the book. You can get all the podcast episodes. The other thing that I just wanted to point out that I think is interesting and lends itself to this conversation is we now have updated transaction reports on the website as well. you, like, I don't know, do you guys realize you can go onto dfy-realestate.com and there's a link at the top that says client success. You can go look at reports for the last 12 years from 2013 through 2025 of every single real estate transaction that Dunphy Real Estate has facilitated for its clients. Every single one. You can see the total volume. We don't do full addresses, but I just wanted to share this with everybody because we're talking about what's been the impact on the market and what does the reset look like? Well, Steve and I believe that this year things are going to open up quite significantly. And we'll go through a couple key predictions that we share with Redfin as to why the market's going to ease up. Kevin Clayson (12:39.841) but just to give everybody an idea, all right? So if you wanna know how much real estate we helped our clients transact in 2022, you can go and get this on the website. The total, do you know what the total was, Steve, in 2022? Steve (12:54.452) Not off the top of my head, like I think, yeah. Kevin Clayson (12:57.345) just under $78 million. Okay, just under 78 million in 2022. If you go look at 2023, 23 was just under 40 million. Okay, so took a little bit of a dip. You go look at 24, okay. 24 is, hold on, tell ya. 24 is, oh come on. When it pulls up, I'll give it to ya. Kevin Clayson (13:30.241) 2024 was more than 2023, okay? It was about 41 million. And then 2025, because this is really what we're talking about, and why I think we are primed for a housing reset and a recovery. If you look at 2025, the full amount in 2025 that we transacted with our clients was right around 25 million. So we went from 80, played around at 40. and then down to 25. Now here's what that indicates to me. That indicates only one thing, which is less people. And that is not just us, Steve. You know very well. The real estate market in general saw, if we saw a, you know, what we went from 40 down to 25%, you're the math guy, Steve. What is that percentage and decrease in volume? Steve (14:19.31) That's about 50. Oh, from 40 to 25. It's about 35 38%. Kevin Clayson (14:23.359) Yeah, it's like, yeah, 35%. The industry dumped like 70 % like a total transaction volume, right? Isn't that, wasn't that the number? was like, I mean, it was massive. So it goes to show that the people that understand real estate will continue to buy and that's who you guys are. That's why you listen to the podcast. But what I think is interesting about that is the reason everything came to a grinding halt, not even a grinding halt, but just slowed down significantly. is because people got scared, people were worried about interest rates, people wanted to stay on the sidelines, people were seeing, what if rents aren't climbing the way I want them to? What if home prices aren't increasing the way we want them to? And all of that, I think we are going to see a reversal of in 2026. And that is not what Steve and I think, it is what we think, but it's also what Redfin thinks. And that kind of leads us in to the main predictions that we're gonna share with you. for the great housing reset of 2026. So Steve, I'm gonna read this first one to you and I wanna get your reaction. So their prediction, which we have already seen come to fruition really is prediction number one, mortgage rates will dip to low 6 % range, which will help to increase affordability. Steve (15:43.821) Yeah, so what's interesting is that that's already happened. mean, interest rates actually dipped below six. They hit 5.99 this last week. They'll probably come back up slightly. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And so it's happening on the interest rate side of things. people are noticing, they're seeing, because, Kev, we've been talking about what I'm gonna say next here for the last three years is that Kevin Clayson (15:53.857) And that's without rate by downs. Yeah. Steve (16:14.286) real estate volume across the board, because I'll share one stat really quick, for just the general industry, for real estate agents nationwide, of the five million plus real estate agents that have been in the industry over the years, NAR provided a statistic that said, I think it was 74 % of all real estate agents did zero transactions. That's how low the volume is. So with that, point that I'm making is that with the dip in interest rates, people are already recognizing and seeing that and looking to jump back in. And the reason why I think Redfin feels pretty confident in saying that there's going to be a significant reset is that the demand, Kev, did not go away. Like it's still there. Like we still, like this country, Kevin Clayson (17:09.919) Yeah, right. Steve (17:13.986) has a shortage of affordable housing to the tune of five plus million homes. And people just haven't been buying because they haven't been able to, or they've been too scared, or the myriad of reasons that we've talked about, the demand is still there. And so when all of the different factors line up, we're going to see a bit of I think we're gonna see a bit of a rush. And that's what this, I think part of the reset is, there's gonna be this slow gradual improvement. I agree that it's going to be slow and gradual, but I can kind of see there's going to be kind of like this like initial like bump where it goes, you know, on a scale of one to a hundred, we'll probably see like this bump of like immediately like bam, like 10, 10%. And then it will kind of gradually go, go from there as like this initial, like the people who are like just literally like they, they've been like preparing and waiting, make sure their credit's good, looking for those jobs, you know. promotion opportunities and then just waiting on the sidelines. And it's kind of like the minute like once you get past this threshold and interest rates get to here like bam, they're in the market. so I think there'll be an initial bit of a rush and then there'll be the slow gradual improvement and the demand has been there and it's just waiting to start being let loose. Kevin Clayson (18:22.964) Yeah. Kevin Clayson (18:38.932) Well, and just to kind of comment on this for anybody listening, when we say that mortgage rates will dip, understand that it's not going to be so significant. So for us, those of us that are investors that are in the market, the interest rate decrease is not going to be something that will be a hundreds of dollars a month difference. It's not gonna be a massive difference in term of payment between what I could go. buy a home for today and what I could maybe in six months time. The difference is this. As soon as the world wakes up to two facts, number one, interest rates are decreasing, and number two, they're not gonna get much lower than they are right now, but they are gonna get a little bit lower. Everybody's gonna go, well, I guess why wait any longer? We better jump in the market. As soon as people feel the slightest bit of confidence, what they will do is they will jump into the market, which they're gonna be gobbling up some of that inventory. Steve already told you, there's still a shortage of affordable housing. If people enter the market, all these people that have been on the sideline, as soon as they enter the market and they start to gobble up some of that inventory, what's going to happen is it's going to teach sellers that buyers wanna buy, which is what's going to increase prices because sellers are gonna feel like they can get a little bit more. Well, if sellers are increasing prices, that means you're buying at higher prices, which means the quicker you buy, the quicker you benefit from the appreciation that you're gonna see as a result of interest rates. Now, here's, and let me just point this out. So if you look at the average 30-year fixed interest rate in 2020, okay, was, now this is across all 30-year fixed rates. So this is. the average investment primary, the vast majority of them are gonna be primary residences. The average interest rate in 2020 was 3.1%. The average interest rate in 2021 was 3.0%. In 2022, it jumped to 5.3. And then those two years, so you look at the years where it, like our volume and the industry in general, they were at Kevin Clayson (20:59.188) seven to six and a half to 7 % in 23 and 24 and 25. So the prediction is that interest rates are gonna be in the low sixes and we've already seen low sixes and high fives. And so even with a new Fed chair coming in, I know that Trump's gonna be placing some pressure on lowering the interest rate. Just as a reminder to everybody, if the Fed lowers the interest rate, that does not necessarily mean that mortgage interest rates are gonna look. lower, it's not a direct correlation. They're lowering the rate of the overnight Fed lending rate, which if that boosts market confidence, that's what makes lenders say, know, really the bonds and yields are gonna react to that, which is what's gonna react to mortgage interest rates as you have people getting a little bit more excited about getting into the market. So yes, interest rates are gonna come down. but the impact is not gonna be on your payment, the impact is gonna be on the market deciding it's time to reenter and you wanna be on the right side of that, that kind of bum rush on the market, because then you get to take advantage of all the upside as everybody decides that they wanna rejoin the fray, right? Steve (22:16.206) Yeah, exactly. And it's interesting to just really quick note that we saw the very reverse. So right now, rates have slowly been coming down and there's a magic number. And I don't know if it's this collective consciousness where all of a sudden everybody goes, oh, and they start jumping in. It was the same thing when interest rates were going up. We could see it in 2022. As interest rates started to climb in 2022, we saw volume began to decrease slowly, slowly. But once we hit, there was a magic number. I don't remember, Kev, exactly what it was, but it was seven points something on the interest rate in Q4 of 2022. And it was like, turned the light switch off and everybody said, that's the magic number. I'm not buying anymore. And that's when the market just kind of like got stuck. And so the reverse is what you just described. Kevin Clayson (23:04.053) Right. Right. We're not doing it. Kevin Clayson (23:11.777) Yeah, it's really, really interesting. Yeah, exactly. And here's the other thing. You said you don't know if it's sort of the collective mindset. I think it is. I studied political science in college, and that's really just the science of how people act, interact in a variety of different conditions. And there is a herd mentality that... absolutely exists, groupthink is a thing. And if you hear on the news that people are buying, if there's enough articles that say, home purchases have increased, what will happen is the herd mentality will kick in, everybody will feel like they are missing out. If they're hearing that people are buying and they are not buying, they're gonna be like, my gosh, I'm missing it. That's how they're gonna jump in. And so all of this will lend itself to a gradual, increase in home buying largely because the group think the herd mentality is, interest rates are getting to a reasonable level. And they are at a level right now where you can cash flow. It's not a lot, okay? But you can still see some positive cash flow, even though now is not a cash flow market, right? Unless you're putting more down. But it's at least to the point where, you you can see some positive, you know, action in that way. All right, so that's prediction number one, right? Interest rates. Here's prediction number two. Home buying affordability will improve as wages grow faster than prices. Now, this one is also sort of a wages are gonna increase and that's gonna have an impact on the market. So it's not the market specifically, it's that the projected wage increase in 2026 is, I'm seeing if there's a percentage, I know I've heard it, but I can't remember what they're anticipating it to be, let's see. They're just saying we expect the median home sale price to rise 1 % year over year in 2026. So prices will tick up marginally. And if you look at the markets that we're in and the homes that we're seeing, that we're seeing on average, that or better, 3 % is probably pretty close to what we're seeing across markets with some markets doing better than others. And all of that being because as the financial world starts to open up a little bit, Kevin Clayson (25:33.569) We're gonna see people feeling a little bit more confident. I'm making a little bit more money. I feel like I'm good with my employment. I'm seeing the interest rates have come down a little bit. I'm hearing that everybody else is maybe jumping into the market. All of that says, okay, I'm entering the market. And with that, because they feel like it's more affordable, we're gonna see those prices increase. Anything you want to add to that one? Steve (25:58.819) Yeah, no, I actually think that they're spot on with this. so the thing to keep in mind, and you kind of alluded to this, is that's 1 % across the country, right? So that's an increased average across the board. So in some markets, you're gonna see higher than 1%. In other markets, you're gonna see lower than 1%. The markets where we buy, you know, have been buying in recently Oklahoma, Indiana, Texas. They've been seeing slight increases even during, you the last couple of years. It's been, you know, flatter than normal, but it's been, you know, the 1 % are higher. And so this coming year in certain markets, we'll definitely see higher than 1%, which is a great start to this reset. Kevin Clayson (26:54.113) Well, and if you, so what they're anticipating is that home sales, this is prediction number three, home sales are gonna rise 3%. So they're predicting that the sale of existing homes in 2026 will be 3 % better than it was in 2025. So that's not prices, that's volume. But what's interesting, I read our transaction volume numbers earlier. If you look at the number of existing homes sold and kind of adjusted for, each year and whatever interest rates were doing, it was like five and a half or so million homes is what they're, so this is from NAR. It's 5.6 million homes sold in 2020. 6.1 million homes sold in 2021. 5 million homes in 2022. And then it dipped down to between three and four million homes. in 23, 24 and 25. And then they're anticipating we're gonna be up between four and 5 % again, or four and 5 million again, at least according to their data. And so again, we're noticing the trend, right? Interest rates were low, volume was up, consumer confidence was high. Interest rates increased, volume decreases, consumer confidence lowers. So now if consumer confidence increases and interest rates come down, it will have a net impact of more people buying and that's gonna have an impact on home prices increasing. So the trends that we've seen over the last 10 years are just being repeated except in the inverse now. And so that's why we felt totally confident in saying, we agree with these predictions just because we've tracked this and watched this for so long that we feel like we feel really confident that we know where it's going. which is why we're constantly advocating that you want to be on the right side of the coin as the as the market starts to ease up and improve. Steve (28:54.274) Yep. So jumping into prediction four, this is an interesting one. This has been kind of this a real dilemma. I don't know if dilemma is the right word, just it's been a real anomaly is rent. So prediction four is that rents will rise as demand for apartments rises and supply falls. And, you know, over the last three years, I mean, during COVID and slightly post COVID, like rent demand was through the roof and rent prices were increasing at in some cases double digits, but certainly seven to 9 % in many areas and higher and even higher in other areas. And then over the last three years there was actually a decrease in rent prices and that was. That was a hard one to truly understand what was going on because if people aren't buying homes, then they're going to have to rent, which would make you think that rents would go up because more people are renting as opposed to buying. But the reverse happened. And so the question became in my mind, well, so where are people living then? And the best explanation I could come up with and that I researched and found some substantiation for this theory is that many people moved back in with parents, they were doubling up with roommates in an effort to lower costs and to just wait out the current economic situation and to prepare to be able to buy. And so what the prediction is here is that as people begin buying and owning more single-family residential, That will put a crunch on supply for rentals. There won't be as many rentals because people are buying them up as primaries. And that will increase demand, or not demand, will decrease the supply, which will increase the demand for renters, which will put upward pressure on rent prices. And so they're expecting the prediction Steve (31:17.87) is that rents, they're predicting that rents will rise two to 3 % year over year by the end of 2026, roughly at the pace of inflation. Does all that make sense? Can you have the way I explained it? Kevin Clayson (31:28.309) Yeah, no, yeah, 100%. And just in terms of real time data, know, as we talk to specialized property management, I could tell you that their days on market are better than national averages. And the days on market have started to improve as far as how long homes are staying on the market. You know, they're still, you know, like, it's not like homes are renting in one day, right? They're taking a month or two. And we find that if you're competitive in pricing, you can rent the properties pretty quickly. So there is still a competitive market in the rental world right now. So you have to price it competitively and you've got to give it some time. But we are seeing that days on market is decreasing and we are seeing that rent amounts are slowly increasing already. And so, cause we were seeing that for a while in order to get homes released or re-rented as clients had one tenant that was moving out in order to release it, they were having to lower rent from what it had been. And so that's kind of where that competitive pricing comes in. If you're buying, know, the pricing should be right where it needs to be to get it to move and to get you, you know, right where you got to be. But so we are seeing in real time already at the beginning of, you know, mid January here that we are already seeing some of this take effect. so, again, we want to when on the right side of the growth curve. Right. And that is right now before things start to ease up, before things start to improve. Now, this is the last one. There's a couple other predictions that I don't think are super relevant to us as investors here. But this one, I think, is relevant to us. It's just kind of interesting. the prediction that Redfin gave is that political parties are going to kind of unite. Policymakers are going to say, all right, We have an affordability crisis. We all want to be reelected. So we've got to find a way to work together to make the affordability improve. And so I think that means both sides of the aisle are going to say, well, maybe we're a little bit more willing to come to the table because if our constituents are happy, they're likely to vote us back. And so as an act of this is not selfless actions by our politicians. It is completely self-serving. Kevin Clayson (33:55.532) preservation, which can be really powerful motivator. if they are trying to preserve their seat, they may be more willing to come to the table to increase and improve affordability for Americans across the board with everybody hoping that they're going to win re-election. And I think that there's truth to that. I think that as we go into the midterms this year, I think that you're gonna see more and more people that, you you're already hearing a lot of stuff from Trump right now on affordability, affordability, affordability. I don't know if it's bipartisan yet. You know, we announced something on healthcare. He's announced this credit card thing that he wants to try to do. I mean, he's been making some inroads into affordability. And I think everybody's gonna kind of come along that same path. And all that's gonna mean is that they can improve affordability, okay? Again, remember to what, and we're gonna wrap with this. Remember what we were talking about earlier. while affordability will be felt by you and I to a certain extent, right? We're already seeing it in gas prices and if gas stays low, know, some of our cost of goods should, you know, even out a little bit, you know, as we're going to the store, it's really hard to lower prices once you raise them. But nonetheless, if everybody's feeling that their wallets are a little bit heavier than they were, and if the policymakers are doing things to make us feel confident, that confidence will translate to people jumping off of the sidelines and back into the market. And as they jump back into the market, that's when we're gonna see, you know, prices increase, rents increase. And if we are currently owning, we get to be the beneficiaries of all that. And so that's really, think, you know, if we look at the great housing reset, long story short, things should improve this year. As things improve, more people are gonna buy. As more people buy, if you own the real estate, you're gonna get to take advantage of the upside. And so like always, if you are considering anything in 2026, I'm telling you, don't wait. Sellers are willing to boogie right now, okay? We are seeing this, we are seeing price cuts, we are seeing seller paid concessions. We already know that some of the builders are starting to pull back some of the incentives that they've been. Kevin Clayson (36:11.537) offering to attract buyers. So if they're pulling back incentives, that tells you the temperature in the market is shifting. And so knowing that now is absolutely the time to take advantage of the best possible opportunities that you're going to have available to you here in 2026. In this first quarter is the time to, you're doing anything, give me a call, reach out to us. If you want to run some numbers, if you want to look at your game plan, if you want to just get a little bit more individual information. Do not hesitate to reach out, because I don't want you to miss a window. And it's always a good time to buy. But right now, you are on the side of the coin where you stand to benefit a lot in 2026 and moving forward, if you're jumping off the sidelines and not being fearful like everybody else and diving in and getting some things done. So that's kind of the last thought I had, Steve. Any last thoughts as we wrap the episode? Steve (37:03.5) Yeah, the thing I'll end with is, The political will right now is definitely in favor of making housing affordable. And they're approaching it from as many angles as they can, not just building less expensive type homes or more dense housing and that kind of thing. But they're approaching it from, we need to figure out wages. We need to figure out interest rates. We need to figure out all of these different things. if anything that I've learned over the years is I've kind of watched how politics affects things, is that they tend to swing the pendulum in the direction that they want things to go to the extreme. And so this economic pendulum swings back and forth all the time, right? And there's only very short moments of equilibrium where the pendulum is kind of in the middle. It's typically either to one way or to the other. And so as they're pushing and pulling and prying this pendulum back over to this other side to get the housing market going again, it's a likely but not guaranteed scenario that the pendulum is going to swing dramatically to the other end again. And then there's gonna be another correction that will pull it back. And so I think what I hear you saying, Kev, is like, you know, It's this idea that we have lived by for a long time, which is Warren Buffett's philosophy and thought process is that you buy when people are fearful and you sell when people are greedy. And right now, everybody is super fearful and the pendulum is about to swing to where that pendulum is gonna be in a position where now everybody, like you mentioned, the herd mentality, Steve (39:00.462) people are gonna jump on and that's gonna swing it even further. And it's when you are able to kind of jump in and take advantage of that swing before it hits disequilibrium at the other end of the spectrum that you can really take advantage. Now, having said that, the beautiful thing about real estate is that pendulum swings fairly slowly. And our philosophy is one of long-term. And so, we've owned the same properties and we've been working with the same clients as that pendulum has swung back and forth like multiple times now. And so the beautiful thing about investing the way that we do is that you don't have to time it perfectly, but there's nothing wrong with trying to get some timing in. It's like, because the benefit will be a little bit better or a lot better and it will take less time. I mean, but over time, you're going to win either way. But there's, like I say, there's nothing wrong with trying to see the signs and make good, you know, good and calculated and wise decisions in terms of, hey, it's like, I have been waiting on the sidelines. I have been waiting. And it looks like maybe this might be the time to jump. And our, I guess our calculation is, I mean, if you didn't jump in a year ago or two years ago, there's still that opportunity before that pendulum swings dramatically to get some of the immediate, not immediate, but more immediate benefit than not. so anyways, I'll just kind of end with that thought. Kevin Clayson (40:40.149) Yeah, I love it. You know, there is a cost to doing nothing, an actual monetary cost to sitting and waiting. And that's really what we've seen. And there's a monetary benefit to acting, especially when you have the right strategy in place. And so not acting for the sake of acting, but acting with the right strategy. And that's all we're talking about. So, well, everybody, thank you for joining us for Prediction Time 2026, the great housing reset. of this next year. We hope you enjoy the pod. As always, please subscribe. Please share it with friends and family. Don't forget to go to dfy-realestate.com. You can go look at those transaction reports I was talking about. You can go and click on that learn more tab and you could get access to micro wins to millions. Please feel free to share it with anybody and everybody that you want to. And if you would give us a five star review on Apple podcasts, that would be awesome. It really helps us. We are gonna keep rolling with live episodes moving forward now week after week. We appreciate you. Thanks for tuning in and we'll talk to you next week. Steve (41:40.844) Have an amazing day.