A new survey from Bankrate found that primary reason 29 percent of renters can’t buy a home is they can’t afford a down payment.  However, at least one out of five of them are overestimating how much they think they will have to raise for a down payment. The more than 3250 non-homeowners participating in the survey expect that they … Read More »

When we published “Will Sellers Step up the Plate in 2016? “two weeks ago December market report weren’t in yet and it was clearly too early to blow the bugle over the inventory picture for the coming season The reports are now in and hands are reaching for the nearest brass instruments.  Too many signals from too many sources are … Read More »

Though 2015 was dubbed the Year of the Millennial, though the final sales data are not yet in, actual purchases by young first-time buyers disappointed many real estate observers. Between July 2014 and June 2015. first–time buyers declined to 32 percent (33 percent a year ago), which is the second–lowest share since the survey’s inception (1981) and the lowest since … Read More »

Fourteen years ago, improving minority homeownership was front burner issue.  In 2002, the Bush Administration even set a goal of expanding the number of minorities who owned their own homes by 5.5 million—approximately the number of existing homes sold in a very good year. The subprime crash and housing depression put a sudden end to that effort.  Minority homeownership plummeted … Read More »

It’s no secret the chronic inventory shortage that began three years ago is a ball-and-chain that’s crippling sales and keeping the recovery from achieving its potential. Evidence: Just as the 2014 market opened in March, Realtors reported a severe inventory shortage in most areas, especially for properties in the lower price range and for those that are move-in ready. In … Read More »

Households headed by adults age 65 or older devoted a quarter of their 2013 income to housing, which includes spending on mortgage interest, rent, property taxes, maintenance, repairs, homeowners’ and renters’ insurance, and utilities. Older households are more than three times as likely as younger households to own their homes free and clear (58 versus 17 percent). Yet, the lack … Read More »

Home prices, including distressed sales, are projected to rise by 5.2 percent from October 2015 to October 2016 after rising 6.8 percent nationally for the single family combined tier this past October, an increase of 1.0 percent for the national single family combined tier, according to CoreLogic’s latest price report. Including distressed sales, the U.S. has experienced 44 consecutive months of … Read More »

‘Closed loan credit scores continued tumble, while DTI rose in October’ promised the headline from Ellie Mae this month. Eagerly I scanned through the data, hoping at last to see a relaxation of the squeaky tight lending standards for purchase loans, enough to really mean something to the millions of young buyers trying to maneuver their way through student loan … Read More »

Tight inventories and strong demand are combining to push starter home prices out of the reach of buyers, keeping them in rentals.  As a result, rents are rising even more, trapping young households in a cycle of price pain with no escape. The latest September data from the CoreLogic HP reports home prices nationwide, including distressed* sales, increased by 6.4 … Read More »

  Over the past two years, homeowners’ confidence in recouping the price they paid for their homes has risen 29 percent.  A biennial opinion survey on housing issued conducted by the National Associate of Realtors shows that fears of selling have abated dramatically since the housing recover hit high gear two years ago. Nearly three quarters of owners (71%) disagreed … Read More »