Episode 183 - Vincent Horcasitas

Discussing The Federal Reserve Interest Rate Cut

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Transcript

Andrew Doud 0:08

All right everyone, it's Thursday. I'm Andrew Dowd. It is time for our Happening in the Hamptons podcast, our weekly breakdown of the Hamptons market, new listings, and events on the East End. We are sponsored by New York Title Abstract, the Hamptons leading title insurance firm. Visit NewYorkTitle.com. We have Steve Glick, Dave Retiner, and today the hardest working man in the Hamptons, Mr. Vincent Jorcasitas. What's going on?

SPEAKER_01 0:31

Well, appreciate uh being here as always.

Andrew Doud 0:33

Hey, look, if we can get you for 15, 20 minutes of your busy day, we'll take it. Um, you got you always have a lot going on. You got new listings, you got things going in the contract, you got I don't know where your phone is. Is a phone look, it's like right by the phone. Yeah, he's ready to go. Uh he's probably gonna miss like 10 calls during this podcast. But what's going on, Vince? What uh what's happening in what's happening in the Hamptons on your end?

SPEAKER_01 0:55

You know, it's the second part of the selling season, seeing an uptick of um you know properties going into contract. Uh, you know, just in the last couple weeks, we had I think seven or eight contracts go out. Wow. Wow. We yeah, we signed uh 33 Jobs lane up, um, which uh you know was a property that was on the market for a while, and then all of a sudden, you know, August came around. We had three offers on it. Um it's just it's it's amazing. Sometimes no offers, and then in three offers.

Andrew Doud 1:22

That's a great place.

SPEAKER_01 1:23

Like they turn the light switch on. We get into September and things uh things change. So is that normal?

Steve Glick 1:28

Is that a typical time of year that we're seeing?

SPEAKER_01 1:31

Yes. I mean, you know, it's it's it seems like you know, July and August nowadays is really where the people kind of just size up the properties. They're out looking at houses, take the kids back to school, and then they start making offers.

Andrew Doud 1:44

That's it. And uh and so what um you have a couple new listings that are coming on too.

SPEAKER_01 1:49

Yes, we just um just listed two uh new properties here at the firm. Uh one of them is 104 Bull Path, which is close to a two-acre property that has uh clearing to be able to put a pickleball or a tennis court on it. It's uh four bedrooms, four baths, uh roughly about three thousand plus square feet. Um you know, beautiful there, Bull Path, and these tall, beautiful pine trees in the back. It's gorgeous. It's a great street.

Steve Glick 2:16

How much is that one?

SPEAKER_01 2:17

Uh that's priced at 2895.

Andrew Doud 2:20

That's in East Hampton? East Hampton, okay.

SPEAKER_01 2:22

Bull Path. Really, really nice. Um, and the second one is south of the highway here in Bridgehampton, uh 550 Paul's Lane. Uh that's listed for 6495. That's a full acre, a buddy and a uh horse farm. Um beautiful street. Everybody knows Paul's Lane. Yep. Um, four bedrooms, three baths in the main house, has a guest uh pool house uh with a two-car garage with some living space and uh and a bathroom in that as well. Um, you know, really mature landscaping there, super private. Um have an open house there on Friday from uh 12 to 130.

Andrew Doud 3:01

This is a this is a great buy for somebody. I think you know the location's amazing. And it's funny because they're two totally separate buyers, I think, for those two listings, right? One's one's East Hampton, one's Bridgehampton, one's Horse Country, one's uh sort of, I guess, village fringe, a little bit outside that East Hampton one.

SPEAKER_01 3:17

Yeah, it's like this this is closer to Swamp Road. I mean you're close, you're close there, you know. You can get into uh SAG in five five minutes and you can get into you know the heart of Bullpath out of the village is probably the best street in um in in uh in East Hampton town.

Andrew Doud 3:34

Um then you got a couple really good Paramount homes that are on the market, right? You got uh 21 Cedar.

SPEAKER_01 3:41

Yeah, 21 Cedar in Rimsenburg is a beautiful Paramount uh development group uh property. Yep. Um, you know, you go in there and see the craftsmanship and the level of construction, it's uh quite uh unique. It also um we just got a permit for a tennis court there. It's a big property. Yeah, yeah. We have open houses every week in there, um, one on Saturday and one on Sunday. And uh please come by and take a look at it. It's super uh extra extraordinary.

Dave Rattiner 4:09

I know you're really passionate about tennis. You're a really unbelievable tennis player, and I always noticed that you mentioned tennis in your listings and other agents do, but you're always very poignant. And you know, how much value does tennis or or the ability to add tennis add to a property in the real world? Like let's say you're not into tennis.

SPEAKER_01 4:29

But my in my opinion, and it it adds about a half a million dollars north of the highway and adds a couple million dollars to the listing on uh wow, that much money south of the highway? F absolutely, you know. Umbelievable. That's unbelievable. Yeah, adds a bit adds a big number to it. So, you know, these zoning changes that we happen at my own property, I just um they just changed the zoning um in Southampton to where it's 50% um lot coverage where it used to be 20% lot coverage. That's a big change. Um, you know, I used uh New York Title to uh run a title report, a single and separate on my property, and I found out that I could um that the zoning wasn't actually uh R80, it was uh I think R60 or R40, which gave me reduced setbacks, and I I got a tennis permit on my property now. So I'm super pumped about that.

Steve Glick 5:19

Watch out, watch out for Vince now.

Andrew Doud 5:21

Hey Vince, the other the other big news this week is the uh federal rate cut. Um I know you know there's kind of broad sweeping implications of this kind of thing as far as economics as a whole, but like where do you see this? Uh how do you see this impacting real estate here on the East End?

SPEAKER_01 5:36

I think it just frees up a lot of money for a lot of people. You know, there'll be a lot more refinancing going on. Um, have a deal going right now where uh you know the the person's parking a bunch of money in a bank and uh he's gonna get like a uh um uh a 10 uh what is gonna a 10-1 arm for around 3%. You know, you haven't heard those numbers in a while, right? Not in years. And so I think that's just you know one for instance, but I just think that the more the uh the three million dollar buyer that you know hasn't wanted to sell their house because they're gonna go into a um you know seven or eight percent uh you know interest rate, now are gonna start selling their houses. And we're seeing that with the uh the influx of uh more listings that are coming on the market. I think there was 50 this week that came on the market. I haven't heard that number in a long time. Yeah um and our inventory is growing. I think we have about 2,000 units on the market, and probably about four, four, what, about four hundred in contracts, something like that.

Steve Glick 6:34

The last time we've seen rate cuts like this has been years. So now we're we're seeing, you know, the the Federal Reserve cut at 50 basis points. So that's just only gonna help, like Andrew said, the whole economy from borrowing money uh for for credit cards, for you know, getting a car, for getting a mortgage, you know, just really hopefully stabilizing the um economy and inflation. So that when it trickles down to real estate, I feel like people are now gonna be more comfortable taking out a mortgage, where if you can get it in the fives, is a lot better than the sixes or sevens. So now they're gonna be more inclined to say, hey, I'm gonna purchase my property or sell my property and purchase another property. And we're seeing that already with 50 plus listings coming onto the market each week. That's only just increasing the overall inventory and giving buyers options to purchase. Where years ago, when you're looking at, oh, there's only five homes to look out in my price range, I'm now I'm not, I'm not gonna list my home. Now, when they're going out looking for a home, you're looking at you know 10 to 15 homes to purchase in your price range. You're more inclined now to put your home on the market because there's other options. And then also people that may not need to borrow money are looking at it saying, well, look, I'm not gonna mortgage the entire bottle. I'll take a small percentage and mortgage it just because borrowing money now is coming down to a to um, like Vince said, you know, 10-1 arms could be in around in the threes, but a 30-year fixed mortgage are gonna be in the fives, and that's more digestible to take out that money uh in a small mortgage.

Andrew Doud 8:03

And we were seeing that a couple of years ago where people would say, I'm gonna put in an all-cash offer and then, you know, so that they were effectively responsible for the purchase of the house, but then get a mortgage anyway because there's no contingency.

Steve Glick 8:13

They're just taking it just because, hey, why not? You know, why not, you know, keep some of my liquid money, you know, and just you know, take the mortgage rate because it's so low.

Dave Rattiner 8:22

Well, Vince, isn't there also this narrative like I, you know, I'm in a three percent mortgage, so I'm trapped in my house, or I'm in a three and a half percent mortgage. I don't want to give it up. I don't want to give it up. I don't want to give it up. Uh what's the number in your opinion that starts to plant the seed where they're like, hey, maybe I will take the you know, four and a half and give it away.

SPEAKER_01 8:41

I think it's getting there. I think you know that starts to, you know, it also, you know, if you have people have a lot of money that are sitting in the bank and they're getting over five percent for just leaving the money in the bank, and as that rate starts to come down too, they all of a sudden say, Hey, I'm getting less and less interest on my money just sitting there doing nothing, you know, just um park there. Let me let me put it to work because I'm not getting the same interest rate as I was before.

Steve Glick 9:05

Right. I think you're right though, Dave. If you're sitting on a three percent mortgage, you're like, there's no way I'm selling this house. But now when the rates are coming down to in the fives, you're like, okay, it's not three. Yeah, it's in the middle. Okay, no problem. I could justify selling this home and purchasing a new one. So we're starting to see that. And already, I mean, look, we're in a selling season here in the Hamptons from right after Labor Day all the way to the end of November. This is a strong selling season. So these the rate cuts only help um our season expand even more. You know, people always think, oh, the summer is your selling season in the Hamptons. That's the time of year where we're listing the properties, where people are enjoying the homes. But as soon as that summer ends, I mean Vince nailed it right on the head. It's like things already are going into contract immediately after the summer season ends. And he has a lot more offers out there, as we know. We can't really discuss them here, but there's offers flying around. There's there's buyers out there. And Vince, you're hosting a lot of open houses too. What what's you have a lot of listings and you're doing open houses. Why are you doing the open houses?

SPEAKER_01 10:10

Well, I think it's a service for for the um for the seller. I mean, you you know, you get it out there, it gets blasted out to all the brokers. And um, you know, commonly on the weekend, buyers come out here and they're looking around, and it makes it easy for them to come and look at the house. And um that's the main reason. That's part of the sales process.

Dave Rattiner 10:29

Yeah, you're relentless with it. I mean, there is there's not a weekend that goes by or even really a day. I can't but not be able to do it. Look, if you have a house.

Steve Glick 10:39

If you have a house and you're not inconveniencing anybody and it's you're available, able to do it, do the open house. You know, it just makes it you know a lot easier for agents to book appointments or be the public to just come in on their own and just check out the house. Oh, totally. So I uh I love seeing it, and with the weather the way it is, it's why not? It's the best time of year out here in the Hamptons, and it's house hunting season. So it's the fall season, but it's also a house hunting season. So every weekend, um you're gonna see a whole bunch of open houses by going to saunders.com and Vince has over a dozen every single weekend.

Dave Rattiner 11:14

Well, the thing is, is like you have to feel the house, like as powerful as the photography is and the videography is, you have to feel the house. And there's some people that you know they walk into an open house that they weren't really gonna look at, but they're like, Yeah, let's just look at it because whatever. And then they're like, oh man, this is I feel completely different here than what I thought it would be, you know.

Steve Glick 11:35

They don't have to sign paperwork, they don't have to make an appointment, they can go in in these houses, be an unrepresented buyer, and tour and get a tour of the property, and that's it makes life a lot easier for the consumer when they have to do that.

Dave Rattiner 11:49

Yeah. Vince, you have this you have this big team that you have behind you that you lead. You know, uh how how is that impacting your business in terms of your ability to service your clients?

SPEAKER_01 12:01

It helps out. I I have 40 listings right now, so between that, I can't do it on my own. I I need uh uh, you know, I have a strong team that's behind me. We just um Aaron Downey just uh joined the team as well, and super excited to have her. She's got a lot of knowledge, and um um I think she'll be a great asset for the team. And and we have Alfredo, we have Elliot, Alba, we have uh, you know, we have a good thing.

Steve Glick 12:24

You got a great crew, and you really and you really work with them and train them. I mean, they're getting the best education from you know the top agent here in the Hamptons from you. So it's exciting to see them all grow and enhance their careers, they're getting listings, they're putting deals together, and it's all you know tied to you and your success. So kudos to you as being a great uh real estate coach to your team. I love watching them grow.

Andrew Doud 12:46

Um, just to bring this this talk of listings and numbers and rates all kind of full circle, let's uh let's send it over to Steve with a breakdown of what we saw this week.

Steve Glick 12:55

All right, this week um listings went up a little bit. There were 27 listings that went into contract. Last year there were 22, so we're looking at an increase year over year of 23%. Two years ago was 29, so it's a small decrease of 7%. The breakdown of the 27 transactions, there was one over 20, one between 10 and 15, 4 between 5 and 10, 2 between 3 and 5, 7 between 2 and 3, 8 between 1 and 2, and 4 under a million. Dollar volume was 103 million. Last year, 64 million, big increase of 61% in dollar volume. Two years ago it was 118 million, um, a small decrease of 13. Um, new listings coming onto the market another week with 50 plus listings. There are 54 new listings coming onto the market that increases the inventory by 27 listings. The 54 new listings breakdown is one between 10, um, one between 15 and 20, one between 10 and 15, 9 between 5 and 10, 13 between 3 and 5, 17 between 2 and 3. So it's a big numbers in the$2 to$5 million category. 10 between 1 and 2, and only$3 under a million. Inventory stands at 2,092 total listings,$1,589 active, and 503 in contract. So we're seeing those total listings creep up um week over week. And I'm sure this is gonna continue as we go into this fall season. Now with the interest rates um being cut, that's only gonna um enhance the market. So we're gonna see the effect of that over the next couple weeks. There you go.

Andrew Doud 14:26

Um Dave. Yeah. What do you got going on this weekend?

Dave Rattiner 14:31

Well, you know, now we're I really feel like we're into fall, you know. So, which is good. Um the traffic is a lot lighter, but if you want to do some fun stuff, you can do the Stephen Talk House is gonna have Jamie, the Jamie McLean band. So they they still rock and roll at the Steven Talk House. There's they still go on, you know, all the way through the winter, really. I mean, so this is a great go-to spot, you know, as things wind down. But um, but it's still it's you know, it's still busy. All is great, man. Yeah, there's still just so much going on. So that's September 20th, uh, 8 p.m. to 11, you know, all night basically. Um, and then I saw this one caught my eye. This is September 21st. This one's called A Touch of Vegas. Uh, and this is in Sag Harbor. Uh Vince, I know you're from Vegas, so I don't know. I don't know. Oh, there you go.

Andrew Doud 15:24

That's right.

Dave Rattiner 15:25

So Sag Harbor and uh Sag Harbor's Kyle Barish and co-star Gina Ryan bring a satirical lounge show parody as the Vegas Crooners and Trent and Trudy Lee. Trent and Trudy Lee are the eccentric Christian Krooner staples of the Las Vegas strip. So this is like a like kind of like a riff on uh you know the Vegas life, uh, but uh in a theater show at Bay Street Theater in Sag Harbor. So I don't know. I thought you would think that was funny. I don't know.

Andrew Doud 15:56

I've never been to Vegas. I've been you've never been to Bay Street. Never been to no, I've never been to Vegas. You've never been to Vegas? I've also never been to Bay Street, but yeah, I've never been to Vegas. Furthest west I've been is Colorado, which is irrelevant to this conversation. But anyway, California. Oh, you gotta get out, yeah.

Dave Rattiner 16:13

You gotta get out. So, and then um my third pick is uh so the retreat is having the which is a charity um in the Hamptons very, very, very, very powerful charity uh supporting uh women and their annual golf outing as at the Atlantic, and that's September 23rd from nine at 9 a.m. Uh runs the whole day. Um so I mean I don't know if you've ever played at the Atlantic, but it's like I mean just to just to join the Atlantic, it's like a million dollars up front or some ridiculous number. I don't even know. Good to know somebody, but it's an absolutely beautiful course, and you can play it. You know, you don't have to be a you don't have to be a member, and there's gonna be coffee and a light breakfast. You go out and play at the Atlantic. I mean, what's better than that? And you're supporting the retreat. So if you're interested in that, you can check that out at Hamptons.com. And you know, we've been playing some golf. We play a little golf every now and then. Not as much tennis as Vince plays, but we play golf. Are you we're not very good at it? Are you a pickleball guy?

SPEAKER_01 17:13

No, you know, I haven't really gone into that.

Andrew Doud 17:15

I might do it this year when I go out to you know, because like that's that's popping up more and more listings. It's like they want the the combo court, you know, like a little tennis, a little pickleball. And tennis, you know, Vince is like, I mean, he's the man when it comes to tennis, like really, really good. So I wonder if like, does it translate to pickleball? I don't know.

Dave Rattiner 17:30

I'm sure it does. Can you be better at one than the other? Probably one of the reasons why it was like invented was to go from tennis to pickleball. You know, some guy who's into tennis.

Andrew Doud 17:37

Feels like it's more running around than tennis. It is more, right?

SPEAKER_01 17:40

Like a little, like a they're they're taking tennis courts and and putting pickleball courts on them now. It's crazy. The tennis clubs, it's like it's super it's happening. These uh you could have bought a pickleball team for about a half a million dollars, and now they're like seven or eight million dollars to buy.

Andrew Doud 17:57

I didn't even know there were teams. I thought this was like a hobby. This is like a pro thing. Oh, that's cool.

Dave Rattiner 18:02

Oh, you could have bought a team for how do we not how did we miss that? This was a thing. Oh man, I wish we oh that would have been awesome. Oh yeah, we still can.

Andrew Doud 18:11

It's like it's probably still a good idea. It's like the bitcoin of the of the sports world. It's probably still a good idea. Should have bought when, yeah. Um, all right, Vince. Uh do we do it? Do we do a restaurant pick for him?

Dave Rattiner 18:22

Oh, restaurant pick? You're gonna say Bill Bouquet. He's gonna say Bill Bokeh. What's your favorite restaurant?

SPEAKER_01 18:29

Bobby Vans. Bobby Vance. Oh, nice. Nothing's better than Bobby Village.

Dave Rattiner 18:35

Yeah, uh I'm with Vince.

Andrew Doud 18:36

That's the best.

Dave Rattiner 18:37

That is the best.

Andrew Doud 18:38

All right, we'll end on that note. Good deal. Good deal. Uh Vince, thanks for joining us. He's gonna get back to work. We appreciate it. We'll see you next time. That's a podcast. I'm Andrew Dowd. That is what's happening in the hands.