Tell me what you think.

Well, I think that the the vacation home market has definitely changed.

People wanted a second property during the pandemic.

They wanted an escape.

I think it's going to be a while.

I do think that the stock market is pushing a lot of people into the second home market.

So it could be an opportunity for growth there as we watch the stock market change as companies IPO.

What does that look like for the future and being able to sustain working and wine industry and teachers and, you know, if you're not married, if you don't have two income, what does the future look like? for housing?

What trends do you see that are positive for the spring home buying market?

Yeah.

So I will say we just released our existing home sales data a couple of weeks ago.

And when we looked at that data, it was rough because we know that January was very difficult weather-wise in more than 30 states, right? But I want to pull out some of the silver linings that I actually did see in that data.

And I think it's always good to look at it holistically, to level set with what the data is, but then to also look at where people are finding those opportunities.

What we're actually seeing is we had a seasonal uptick in first-time homebuyers.

It's always better for first-time homebuyers in the winter, but actually was higher than where we were last year at the same time.

What would you say about that survey?

Do you agree?

I do.

I think that 2026 is a year of recovery for the housing market.

If we look at the housing market over the last few years, we have averaged about 4 million unit sales pace for the existing home sale sector.

If we look before the pandemic, we would have averaged 5 million, so we can see just how far off we are, and we have to scoot all the way back to the 1990s, 30 years ago, frankly, before we can see home sales activity that low.

So we have a ways to go to make it back to that 5 million unit pace, but we are climbing out of that, and I think this is good news when we think about, uh, the economy overall and how much housing is a driver in the overall economy.

Ninja? Remember ninja loans? Um, do you have the same kind of skepticism about, uh, Washington involvement?

Well, I can say that here in the DC area, I, I, you know, I feel confident, I- that our, our lawmakers are trying different ideas.