Sellers, buyers see tables turn

New-home lull shifts the rules, from the Arizona Republic, reports that demand for new homes in the Valley has fallen, changing the rules where the sellers had the upper hand just a few months ago. Price increases for new homes are slowing, lotteries are fewer, commissions are rising and incentives are coming back. None of this means that the Metro Phoenix new home market is near collapse. Housing analyst R.L. Brown says the market is on track for a performance similar to last years record, though it has hit a bottleneck issuing building permits. "There's no question that the market is changing," said Brown, publisher of the Phoenix Housing Market Letter, "The biggest proof of that is price increases have really started to moderate. When they stop walking in the store, you stop raising prices." Another reason cited for the slowdown is that many of the investors have left this market for places like New Mexico and Texas.

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