You’ve likely been hearing this lately about the real estate market on Guam – that it’s a “seller’s market” out there. For homebuyers, this is a real struggle: the lack of inventory.
Hardly any new homes are being built lately. The severe shortage of skilled labor for the construction industry has put a screeching halt to many builders’ plans. This shortage – or lack – of new homes for sale has led to a rush from buyers to select from the inventory of existing homes. Yes, we are “re-cycling” homes on Guam.
But there’s absolutely nothing wrong with purchasing an “existing” home. Many of the older homes are solidly built with poured-in-place concrete as opposed to new homes that are built from concrete blocks. I’ve seen from my years of selling homes on Guam that the poured-in-place concrete homes of old withstand the earthquakes so much better. Take a look, after an earthquake, at the newer homes built from concrete blocks and you’ll, more than likely, see fine lines of cracks in the plaster. These lines do not, however, mean that there are structural cracks. These plaster cracks are easily fixable.