Hello, and welcome to the Spotlight Vancouver podcast.
I am your host, Doug Varenas, and today we're going to get into the speech that Trump made
to the joint session of Congress, and we're going to separate the news from the noise,
and we're going to determine what bearing this has, if any, on the Vancouver real estate
market.
I know there's lots to talk about.
Let's get into it.
So, the other night, Trump had his joint session to Congress, and to no one's surprise, he did
Trumpy things.
He's the best president since George Washington.
America's on fire, and it can only be put out by him, and he laid out his plan, and
he did his thing.
He did his general president, Trump Spiel, his kind of act.
And so, this isn't a political statement.
This is just what he does.
And so, and I've been sucked into this too, and what I recommend you do is to just stop.
Don't react.
Don't do the reacting to everything he says, and you see something on TV, and he says his
crazy thing, and you go, ah!
And whatever your opinion is, it's great, or it's this, or it's that.
People get bogged down into the noise.
And then what happens is they get analysis paralysis, and they don't know how to react,
and they don't know how to interpret it.
When there's really, there's things to interpret, and there's things to pay attention to for
sure, but all the bellicose statements and the grandstanding is just, I look at it as
like an act, and that's his thing, and you gotta read between the lines, but the first
thing you gotta do is just take a breath and try not to react to all that stuff.
I mean, have an opinion about it, but don't let it affect your decision-making process.
Take a step back.
Think about what's going on.
Try to get to the root of it.
I'm gonna help you do that today, especially with regards to the real estate market.
But I look at President Trump as kind of the big brother who teases you, like, I'm not
touching you.
I'm not touching you.
He's just trying to poke and prod, get a reaction.
I know this because I was that big brother, so apologies, Scott.
I did these things.
So I know what it's like.
Poke, poke, poke.
Poke the bear, make statements, get a reaction from people.
And President Trump is a master at doing that.
That's what he does.
That's his deal.
So what were the actual takeaways and how is this gonna affect the real estate market,
if any?
Let's do a little deep dive into that.
We also had a jobs report today that was just kind of flat.
The stock market has reacted to it just kind of bleh.
It was down earlier.
It's been down the last couple of days.
This is not financial advice, but I'm definitely buying this dip a little bit at a time, buying
it on the way down, monitoring it because I do think it's a tremendous opportunity long
term.
I think that's what you're interested in, that's what you do.
I'm looking at investing right now.
And so what actually came out of that speech that was interesting was basically it's this
theme of returning manufacturing to the states.
And I think that's really what it is.
Like during the COVID, we had the infamous supply chain disruption stuff and you couldn't
get anything and you couldn't get medicine and products and this and that.
And so I think strategically one of the takeaways from his speech was that I think through these
tariffs, he's looking to build that American manufacturing base and to make that supply
chain a little more local.
And I think that strategically could be a good idea given that we do depend on foreign countries
quite a bit, especially China and Vietnam and a lot of other countries.
And that he wants to bring these manufacturing processes back to the US and he's going to
do that possibly through tariffs and having investment by the private sector into the
US.
And it's unclear what long-term effect that would have.
Does that make products more expensive?
Because we have to pay American workers, livable wages and benefits.
Because the big advantage to outsourcing a supply chain is that you get those products
are cheaper because they don't have the same labor costs.
That's been our whole business model for quite a long time.
So the tariffs, we've had tariff talk before.
I mean, in the first Trump presidency, it was a lot of tariff talk.
It sort of basically came to nothing.
And so I am giving the chance of the tariffs actually happening at like a coin toss basically.
And at the end of the day, I think they're more of a bargaining chip and they do get
a reaction from the countries that he threatens tariffs on.
So Canada and Mexico, we've seen them sort of capitulate early on in the Trump presidency
when he's mentioned tariffs.
I think overall, those countries have more to lose than we do.
The smaller countries that do business with us with those tariffs are going to be hurt
more is my opinion.
And I think that's what would happen.
I'm not as sure with China because we do rely on them quite a bit for a lot of our manufacturing
needs.
It's unclear, but what is clear is that we don't know if they're going to happen.
And this could be a huge bluff.
So I think what would happen if we did see those tariffs and they went on is the price
of certain goods would rise and that would include home manufacturing supplies like lumber,
flooring, whatever is used to build a house.
The prices for those construction materials would go up and then we would see those price
increases being passed on to the consumer.
So if the Trump tariffs were to go into effect and we saw that happen, there's a chance that
home, new construction especially, could get a lot more expensive, which would mean in
my mind, if new construction got to be less competitive, we would see more demand in resale
homes where they're already built.
So you don't have to worry about that.
And so I think it would mostly affect new construction.
And of course, if people had to pay more for certain goods just from a consumer perspective,
they might be less willing to buy a home, which could drive prices down.
It is really hard to say what would happen.
Theoretically, price of new construction would go up if the tariffs, the cost of tariffs
were passed to those builders.
Again, not sure this is even going to happen.
Could be a big nothing burger and a lot of noise.
So my advice again is to ignore the noise.
Let's look at some data.
Let's think about what's actually going on because part of what Trump also mentioned
in that speech, the joint session speech to Congress was that private sector companies
were going to invest billions of dollars into the American economy.
He mentioned Apple's $500 billion investment in the US.
He mentioned Taiwan Semiconductor investing in the US.
I know that certain pharmaceutical companies like Eli Lilly have earmarked money to deal
with those supply chain issues and to manufacture more in the US.
So there's a lot of movement to bringing that supply chain back here and investing in the
US.
So I think overall, these are very bullish signals that the economy is going to be strong
in the future and that these companies wouldn't invest if they didn't believe they were going
to see a return on that investment.
So that's also what I took from that speech is that there's a lot of investment coming
in from these big companies and that usually is going to mean that the economy is going
to do a lot better.
We'll have to see.
Again, it's really hard to, because of all the chaos and all the noise, it is hard to
know what's actually going to happen because we haven't had the tariffs yet.
We have, this is supposed to happen on April 2nd, not April 1st, April 2nd.
We'll see.
Like I said, I believe that it's basically a bargaining chip to get people to renegotiate
deals and we've seen this act before.
So I think it's more of a bargaining chip.
But the other news that we got from that speech was the massive amount of investment that
companies are looking to make in America.
And I think that's always a good sign when companies do that because it just means the
economy, they forecast the economy being strong and that people are going to be able to buy
their product and that they're going to see a return on their investment.
So when you actually see that money flowing in, put your money where your mouth is.
When you see that money and companies making those investments, there's nothing abstract
about that.
That is an investment that they're looking to see a return on and they believe that the
economy is going to be strong.
So if we take a look, let's just take a look at the weekly Clark County numbers here.
So I'm looking at 13.6% week over week growth in the median sales price, 11.3% increase in
the average sales price, 14% increase in new listings, 41.7% increase in closed sales.
All of this is super bullish news.
All of this means that the Clark County housing market is strong and that we're seeing some
appreciation and activity increases.
On the ground, there's more multiple offers, especially for homes in great locations that
are remodeled.
But all across the board, we're just seeing more activity, more offers.
Man, I even saw multiple offers on a place that I did an open house on that.
I mean, it needed a lot of work.
It needed a lot of work.
It was in a great neighborhood and then they ended up getting multiple offers and this
was on a place that needed like some sewer work done.
So all in all, the market looks incredibly strong here in Clark County.
And I'm not just saying that, I have numbers to back it up.
So what does Trump's tariffs mean for the housing market in Vancouver?
Right now, nothing.
It means that it's roaring, it's busy.
And if you're on the fence, again, you always have to look at your personal situation, but
do not listen to the noise.
You honestly have to train yourself to just tune out the noise and pay attention to what's
actually going on.
It helps if you can talk to professionals that know what they're talking instead of
your grandma and the guy at the bar and the people that have an opinion about the noise.
Because ultimately what I've noticed in people that hyper-focus on all the noise is they
just get paralysis.
They just can't move.
They can't make a decision.
The sky is falling.
They're so worried about it.
Or they're so focused on it.
They lose track of their own situation and what they can control.
And so they're really hyper-focused on all the pomp and circumstance that we've seen
since Trump retook office.
But if you look at the data of what's happening in Clark County and you look at the overall
trends that are going on with, like I mentioned, the private sector investment in American
manufacturing as well as the general 10 towards deregulation.
Deregulation tends to be good for the economy.
Whatever your personal beliefs on that, they tend to juice the economy when there's less
red tape that people have to go through.
The potential lowering of taxes, corporate taxes, personal tax rates, that's always good
for the economy too.
Nobody likes to pay taxes.
And when tax rates are lowered, that tends to boost the economy as well.
So there's a lot of signs that we're looking at a pretty strong economy.
Like I said, the job report came out and it wasn't spectacular, but it wasn't disastrous.
I think there was like 145,000 jobs created.
It's hard to interpret those statistics because they're so kind of juiced one way or the other.
There's a certain amount of politics involved with those as well.
But overall, there was no alarming news there.
There was no alarming news in the economy and the tariffs had not had.
There is no tariffs right now for one.
And two, it's doubtful right now.
We'll see because there's going to be a lag effect if there is actual tariffs.
But for right now, the housing market in Clark County remains incredibly robust and is becoming
more active.
If you just look over the week, over week stats, people are buying and selling homes.
We did see a little dip in interest rates.
Trump mentioned that in his speech as well.
He wants the interest rates to come down.
So for whatever political influence he has, he's going to use that to try to get interest
rates down.
It's unclear if that's going to happen.
I would not count on the interest rates going down.
I would operate in a high 6%, 7% interest rate environment.
That's how I would do my math.
That's what I would plan for.
I would not wait around for the interest rates because you're going to miss out on appreciation
that we've seen recently and that we've seen historically.
And so again, if you're trying to time these things and you're trying to figure out what's
going to happen, I sincerely believe that.
I believe you're going to miss an opportunity.
So it's more about your personal situation and where you're at and what you're looking
for and if you're ready and your financial situation.
So tune it out.
Watch it, pull what's valuable and ignore the rest and make a decision based on that.
So again, sky's not falling.
A lot of positive economic indicators, a lot of positive indicators on the housing front.
I hope this helps you, if it does, feel free to like and subscribe, leave a comment, let
me know what you noticed and what you're seeing.
I'd love to hear about that.
If you're looking to buy or sell here in Vancouver, Washington or the Portland metro area, reach
out to me.
If you're looking to move out of state, I have a robust network of agents that I know personally
that can help you out as well.
So definitely get in touch with me about that.
I hope this really helps.
Again, I've had to do this myself and kind of make this into a practice, but just to
take a deep breath and just try to ignore the bellicose rhetoric, focus on what's actually
going on and you'll be a lot less stressed out and you'll be able to make better decisions.
So I really hope this helps and I hope you're doing well and I'll catch you on the next
episode.
See you soon, everybody.