EL CAJON (KGTV) — Trump wants to implement tariffs on our top three trading partners. While Mexico and Canada's tariffs are on a 30-day hold, China's already went into effect.
One realtor expects those to mark-up the price of homes.
Nicole Shackelford is on the hunt.
"Three bedrooms, something family oriented, I'm really just trying to find the perfect home for me and my kid," said Shackelford, describing her dream home. She's hoping to get one here in San Diego where she was born and raised.
But right now, she's feeling a lot of emotions when it comes to the market, specifically because of the tariffs.
"It could go either way," said Shackelford. "I mean it's kind of scary right now with the market to really even afford a home right now out here in San Diego. It's really hard. I feel like with the tariffs, it's harder to get things imported."
She's currently working with her realtor, Mary Zullo, who's been working in real estate for 30 years.
"There's a lot of buyers in the market right now," said Zullo. "But they're kind of holding out to kind of see what's going to happen. I do feel like of course, if interest rates have a big play in it. We have about 5 million buyers that would be added to the real estate market if interest rates came down 1 percent."
Zullo said she expects the prices of a newly constructed home to increase by 5%. That's about $21,000 on a new median-priced home.
She said roughly 60% of all hardware imports come from China, Canada and Mexico.
Zullo said the biggest issue that's hitting the market? Having enough housing stock.
"The problem with the inventory is that people are stuck with these two-and-a-half, three percent interest rates right now," said Zullo. "They're not going to go and buy another home, because the interest rates are twice as what they've had, so that's going to be a problem for the long run until interest rates can come down a little bit lower."
Shackelford said in all the uncertainty, she just wants the best home at the best price.
Zullo said another common material used to build homes is sawmill wood. Nearly three-quarters of important sawmill wood products come from Canada.
