MILFORD — In the spring, the New Hampshire Association of Realtors conducted telephone survey of 500 registered voters regarding the climate of real estate.

The results showed voters have a generally positive view of the state’s direction: 62% believed things are going well, but more than a quarter (27%), believe that things are on the wrong track.

“Our goal was to get a temperature reading on what’s going on in our current marketplace,” association President Dan O’Halloran said. “A lot of people are pleased with their house — happy with their mortgage rate. These people got in a good time with a good rate. That motivation to change their housing situation is pretty tough; they’re at 3.25% or less for a mortgage.”

O’Halloran said the values, “are the highest we’ve seen. Right now, the median price for a home is $315,000, up almost 7% since last year.”

However, as the homeless problem in Greater Nashua continues to accelerate, many say need for affordable housing is clearly a challenge in the state.

“That’s high among seniors and our younger generation of millennials, who are having a hard time finding affordable housing,” O’Halloran said. “But with our day-to-day business of working with buyers and sellers, we weren’t surprised by those figures.”

O’Halloran used an example of the sale of a home in New London.

“The home was listing for $285,000 in and we had two offers,” he said. “One was someone who was a retiree, putting plenty of money down, versus first-time buyer who was not putting a lot of money down. And the seller looked at the balance of risk and went with the retiree. It’s all about risk. Some retirees are coming in with more cash. And if you look at workforce housing, and millennials, they’re competing against a stronger demographic of seniors.”

Many seniors downsize or opt for a home with a first floor bedroom.

“Having first floor living when you’re later in life is definitely a major factor when folks are trying to get away from stairs,” O’Halloran highlighted. He added that much of what came in, numbers-wise, was aligned with the association’s expectations.

“We conducted the poll and it seemed timely with the current climate that we were seeing. We wanted the data to back up our thoughts,” he said.

As predicted, rents are extremely high.

“That’s true,” O’Halloran said. “That’s the squeeze across the board. New Hampshire right now is relatively high in general.”

The survey found the majority of voters consider housing costs to be a serious problem, on par with property taxes and school funding.

Regarding the cost to rent an apartment, 26% considered the problem to very serious, 64% considered it a serious issue, and 22% said it is slightly more troubling than the cost of home ownership.

“There’s a contingent that doesn’t want to see more development,” O’Halloran said. “There’s some that want change and more affordable housing and higher density. But, there’s also a way to have a balance.”

O’Halloran said when you look at information from the survey, and then local town planning and zoning regulations, those become very limiting factors for development costs.

“There are ways to build developments that have a nice positive impact on that community,” he said. “But depending on what those regulations are, it keeps those developers from having those liberties to make it aesthetically pleasing because of the infrastructure costs that mandated through the zoning boards.”

So, when examining the state of New Hampshire, are most real estate pockets heading in a positive or a negative direction?

“That’s a loaded question,” he said. “I don’t know every single area across the state, but I do know that in Londonderry, there are a lot of developments going on. In Nashua and Amherst, there are some interesting developments happening. There’s a lot going on. Some towns are latching on to some workforce housing, but there are numerous towns that are not.”

O’Halloran added, that “as an association, we’re trying to keep an eye on and identify if there are issues going on, or people are making the wrong assumptions. We’re trying to help our members in those communities have a voice and give them information to help support those kind of processes.”

As for employment, which is at a high, the expectation is that millennials would remain in New Hampshire after college, but that’s not always the case.

“People should be making a good income,” O’Halloran said. “That said, when you look at the statistics that we have, there are over 2,000 new homes needed to mobilize our statewide housing and over 10,000 new units are needed to provide housing for our labor force.”

“I think the better we can address the need for housing and make it affordable, we’ll be able to maintain that younger work force and that would obviously definitely help our economy, “ O’Halloran added.

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