LEXINGTON, Ky. (LEX 18) — If you’ve got your eye on a home, now may be the perfect time to claim it before it’s gone, according to a new housing market report which indicates we’re coming out of a slump.

The recent report revealed the nation’s housing slump deepened in June as housing sales slowed. Although June might have been a slump, Kentucky real estate agent Cynthia Trgo says, July is the month to buy.

“A lot of slow-down activity because people are traveling and doing more than they have the past few years because of COVID,” explains Trgo. “Right now it’s a little bit more a buyer’s market. We’ve got a lot more inventory that’s sitting and not as much competition for those buyers. So the buyers sitting on the sidelines wanting to make a move, now’s a great time to do that.”

In May 2023, total housing inventory sat at 2,425 homes. As of May 2024, there’s been a 16% increase, according to Bluegrass Realtor’s.

“So a healthy, stable real estate market is about four to six months of inventory. Right now, we’re sitting at about four-point-one. So this should give a lot of people confidence as to where our market goes and how stable we truly are,” said Trgo.

Today’s average interest rate is around 7% for a 30-year fixed home mortgage. Which is why a lot of sellers aren’t putting homes on the market. If those interest rates drop, home prices will increase.

“Depending on the type of market, whether you’ve got your luxury market, your entry level market. But we’re sitting around that 250 to 270-thousand-dollar mark,” Trgo explained.

According to Bluegrass Realtor’s, the average home spends 38 days on the market. If you have your eye on an open door, it might be time to close on it before you miss your chance.

On Sunday, President Joe Biden announced he is dropping out of the 2024 presidential race. Since his announcement, many have scrambled to make sense of what comes next for the Democratic party ahead of the Democratic National Convention (DNC) next month and, more importantly, the election in November, when a new candidate will face former President Donald Trump.

Immediately following his announcement, President Biden offered his full endorsement to current Vice President Kamala Harris. While another candidate could be decided by the DNC, Harris is the only one who would have access to the millions of campaign dollars raised by the Biden-Harris ticket.

Harris released a statement Sunday stating she was honored to receive the President’s endorsement and plans to “earn and win” the nomination. As many prominent Democrats continue to announce their support of Harris and reports coming in Tuesday morning that she has secured enough delegates to secure the nomination, the conversation is turning to who would be her pick for vice president.

Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear is one of the individuals named in the speculation. He fully endorsed Harris on Monday morning and while he did not clearly say whether or not he is being considered or if he would take the job, he said he would take another job only if “I could further help my people and to help this country” but also added “I think if somebody calls you on that, what you do is at least listen.”

Beshear joined Kentucky business leaders on Tuesday at an exclusive event hosted by the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce where he, of course, discussed the progress Kentucky has been making in recent years but also touched on many points related to the national political landscape.

Kicking off the event, Kentucky Chamber President and CEO Ashli Watts said it is always great to see Kentucky highlighted at a national level given that Beshear has been a part of the speculation on the vice president pick. She also noted the positive relationship the Governor has had with the business community throughout his time in office.

Kentucky Chamber Chair-Elect Scott Davis, CEO of Field and Main Bank, said it is an exciting time to build upon the successes of the Kentucky Chamber’s work. Davis also thanked the governor for his work with the business community.

In his remarks at the Chamber event with many of the state’s top business leaders, Beshear said he loves the Commonwealth of Kentucky and emphasized how meaningful his jobs as attorney general and now governor have been. He said seeing Kentucky front and center has been special to him and he hopes it is special to others, too.

“The rest of the country is yearning to be more like us in Kentucky. And it’s about time!” Beshear said. “And I don’t say that in a partisan way because it has taken everyone to get us to this point.”

Similar to what he said in national interviews, Beshear said people don’t wake up thinking about the presidential election but instead are worried about a good job, health care, safe infrastructure, public safety, and public education. “And none of those are partisan at all,” he said, adding the policies the state and even the nation need now are ones that lift up every person regardless of party.

“Elections are supposed to be years apart so you can stop being partisan and work with others to get things done,” he said, adding he does not care who gets the credit as long as policies are ensuring a state and country that is better for his children and everyone.

The Governor just returned from a trip to South Korea and Japan. He joked that he is still jet lagged from that trip and was when he did an interview the night before.

“I might have said some things,” Beshear said referencing his comments directed toward new Republican Vice-Presidential candidate and Ohio U.S. Senator J.D. Vance.

Expanding on his trip, he said other countries are excited about what Kentucky is doing. Additionally, he said it is incredible to see the difference in the last four or even eight years.

“We are now the first call companies are making instead of claiming they don’t have our number,” Beshear said.

Pointing to another budget surplus announced in recent weeks and $32 billion in new private sector investments during his terms, the Governor said he is excited to see the growth in all areas of Kentucky.

“If any part of our state is not thriving, we are not succeeding,” he said.

In closing, Beshear said he plans to continue to give Kentucky everything he has regardless of where he is or what role he is serving in.

Stay tuned to The Bottom Line for more updates.

Last December, a committee of Kentucky lawmakers met to hear a presentation from legislative analysts that confirmed a longstanding concern with the way the state doles out road paving contracts: Single-bid jobs are costly.

According to the Legislative Research Commission analysts, most of the contracts awarded by the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet from January 2018 through July 2023 went to companies that submitted the only bid to do the work.

Without competition, the analysts found that those jobs cost taxpayers more money than other paving projects that pitted two or more companies against each other to bid for the lowest price.

The presentation followed a 2021 Kentucky Center for Investigative Reporting analysis which found that nearly a third of all road work contracts awarded between 2018 and 2021 went to single bidders — costing taxpayers $9.6 million more than state officials’ estimates.

The legislative researchers provided a list of policy recommendations they said could make the bidding process more competitive — like ending the practice of publishing a list of contractors who planned to submit bids for a project, which the analysts warned can stifle competition.

Brandon Storm, a Republican from London and chair of the oversight and investigations committee that heard the presentation about single bids, said a full report on the issue would be released in January 2024.

But lawmakers have yet to release the report. And Kentucky Transportation Cabinet officials have implemented just one of six policy changes recommended by the analysts — they started using software to help detect collusion in the bidding process, according to a cabinet spokesperson who said the cabinet was working to implement other recommendations.

In the months following the committee meeting, Kentucky transportation officials have continued to award single-bid contracts, resulting in higher costs for the taxpayers, according to research from Andrew McNeill, president of the research organization KY Forum for Rights, Economics and Education.

McNeill has tracked Kentucky Transportation Cabinet bids for years, often arguing the state’s practice of awarding single-bid contracts is fiscally irresponsible.

He analyzed state transportation contracts awarded in the first six months of 2024 and found $142 million in work awarded to single-bid contracts, which he estimates is about $4.5 million more than state officials would have paid if multiple companies vied for contracts.

He based his estimation on research from the University of Kentucky in 2015 that determined that bids with two or more bidding companies resulted in costs that were 86.6 percent of the state’s estimated costs.

These numbers are similar to those presented to the legislature in December. Legislative analysts at that presentation said single-bid contracts cost 100.5% of the engineers’ estimate, while those with two or more bidders cost 93.3% of the estimates.

McNeill said wasting money on single-bid contracts takes away funding that could be used on other transportation needs across the state.

“These dollars are going towards these companies’ bottom line, because the Transportation Cabinet is either unwilling or incapable of designing procurements to generate competition,” he said.

Naitore Djigbenou, the spokesperson for the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet, said in an email that “fostering a competitive bidding process for advertised projects has always been our goal and part of the Transportation Cabinet’s longstanding effort to continually benchmark procurement practices and results with other states.” Djigbenou said the cabinet has been working to implement five of the six recommendations from the presentation, and Djigbenou said those changes “are at various degrees of implementation.”

Chad Larue, executive director of the Kentucky Association of Highway Contractors, said he’d defer speaking to reporters until after the legislators issue their promised report.

The investigations and oversight committee has met twice this year, in June and July, respectively. The topic of single-bid contracts was not on either meeting’s agenda. Storm, the committee chair, said in an email to KyCIR that he anticipates the report will be released in August.

To McNeill, the delay raises questions.

“Why wouldn’t the legislature want the public to see the full report? Is there something in there that is more damning than what was presented in December? Are they simply more interested in protecting their friends in the highway contractor industry and their relationship with the Transportation Cabinet than they are with being transparent with the public?” he asked.

Power, problems and politics

Asphalt companies are powerful job suppliers that donate thousands to political campaigns. Online records maintained by the Kentucky Registry of Election Finance show asphalt company employees across the state donated $117,000 thousand in donations from employees of asphalt companies during the 2023 election cycle.

The industry also has a checkered past. Leonard Lawson, who founded paving company Mountain Enterprises, was accused of bid rigging and indicted on federal antitrust charges in 2008. He was acquitted of those charges along with two state transportation cabinet officials.

Federal investigators raided the Lexington offices of ATS Construction and its subsidiaries, companies owned by Leonard Lawson’s son, Steve Lawson, in 2017 as part of another federal antitrust investigation. Company officials did not immediately return a request for comment.

After the December committee meeting, the cabinet agreed to monitor contracts awarded for work in Fayette County and follow up if the pattern of single-bid contracts continued. According to McNeill’s review of the data for 2024, the cabinet awarded $52.8 million in single-bid contracts in Fayette County.

December’s hearing included some explanations for the lack of competitiveness in Kentucky’s road paving industry. Asphalt can only be transported for 30 to 40 minutes before it starts to set, so companies are limited to jobs close to asphalt plants. And asphalt plants are expensive, making it difficult for new companies to enter the industry. Researchers said about half of all asphalt contracts from 2018 to 2023 went to single bidders, with five companies winning 60% of single-bid contracts.

At the time, lawmakers seemed unbothered by analysts’ findings.

Sen. Reginald Thomas, a Democrat from Lexington, said he didn’t see the problem with the state’s contracting system.

“As I sit here and listen to all these different points, I’m trying to figure out, what’s the problem here?” Thomas asked. “There’s no indication the quality of the work is not fine.”