DAVENPORT, Iowa — The National Association of Realtors' latest report showed the median price of homes is up 15% since last year. CEO of Ruhl & Ruhl Realtors, Caroline Ruhl, said the Quad Cities housing market is seeing similar trends.
"In the Quad Cities, homes appreciated 11.5% which is less than national. But for us, that's really, really good," Ruhl said.
She broke down that number for both sides of the river. On the Illinois side of Quad Cities, the average price of housing increased by 6%, while Iowa's side saw a 3% increase.
"It's historically normal as interest rates go up, that pushes a lot of buyers into the market because they want to get in before they go up further," Ruhl said.
The higher price tag on homes isn't slowing down sales at Ruhl & Ruhl, either.
"We are still listing a lot of new houses, a lot of homes are getting listed. But it looks like nothing is selling, or you know, nothing is for sale, because they're selling so quickly," Ruhl said. "First quarter this year, we sold 10% more homes than we sold in the first quarter of last year. There are lots of homes coming on the market, they're just churning very quickly."
Ruhl doesn't recommend holding out on buying a house in hopes that prices will go back down in the Quad Cities.
"I think you'll see that in Florida where maybe prices have you know, they're going up 30 percent. I think those probably will come back down, but not in the Quad Cities, because we haven't gotten up as much as the national market. We have always been a really conservative, slow, steady market, which really is a good thing," Ruhl said.
The National Association of Realtors report showed that the average time homes stayed on the market was just 17 days in March.