Fewer new homes were in the pipeline in February, as housing starts for combined multifamily and single-family homes plunged 7 percent month over month, the U.S. Commerce Department reports. Housing production for the month was at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.24 million units.“The fall in housing starts in February is a movement in the wrong direction,” says Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the National Association of REALTORS®.
For your clients who enjoy the perks of small-town living, realtor.com® researchers have identified the best places to call home—and the Midwest reigns supreme. Realtor.com® came up with its 2018 list of most affordable small towns by factoring in the cost of housing, employment, and safety.Millennials have love for small towns, with about 21 percent of home buyers ages 37 or younger purchasing a home in a small town compared to 16 percent
Homeowners and appraisers are seeing more eye-to-eye when it comes to home values. Appraised values in February were, on average, just 0.53 percent below homeowner estimates—the fifth consecutive month where the gap between the two groups has been less than 1 percent, according to the National Quicken Loans Home Price Perception Index.Still, more than three-quarters of metro areas had appraised values that were higher than owner estimates. Dall
Though homeowners are gaining equity across the country, the number of underwater borrowers in some areas remains high. The metro with the highest share of homeowners with negative equity is Miami-Miami Beach-Kendall, Fla., where the number of those in the red has grown 13.1 percent year over year, according to a new report from CoreLogic.Nationwide, the number of homes with a mortgage in negative equity—which can occur due to a decrease in a
Homeowners who don’t live near a federally recognized floodplain may still be at risk of flooding, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency severely underestimates the number of people who could potentially be affected, according to a new study in the journal Environmental Research Letters.Researchers from the University of Bristol in the United Kingdom, the Nature Conservancy, and the Environmental Protection Agency say that the U.S. pop
The median down payment on a single-family home or condo in the fourth quarter of 2017 was $18,000, up 20 percent from $14,950 a year prior, according to a new report by ATTOM Data Solutions. The 2017 figure represents 7.1 percent of the median sales price of the home purchased, up from 6.2 percent in the fourth quarter of 2016.Among 143 metro areas analyzed, the top five cities where residents paid the highest down payments in the fourth quarter
Homeowners with mortgages have seen their equity increase 12.2 percent year over year, according to CoreLogic’s newly released Home Equity Report. Homeowners gained more than $15,000 in home equity between the fourth quarter of 2016 and the fourth quarter of 2017—the highest growth in home equity in four years, according to the report. Western states saw the largest increases.“Home-price growth has been the primary driver of home-equity wea
Following nine consecutive weeks of increases, borrowers finally got some relief this week with mortgage rates. The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage posted its first week-over-week decrease of 2018.“Tuesday’s Consumer Price Index report indicated inflation may be cooling down; headline consumer price inflation was 2.2 percent year over year in February,” says Len Kiefer, Freddie Mac’s deputy chief economist. “Following this news, the 10-year
Replace lightbulbs. The typical American household spends 5 to 10 percent of its energy budget on lighting alone, according to the DOE. Replace incandescent lightbulbs with LEDs, which on average are 85 percent more energy-efficient. You can shave $100 a year on your energy costs by making the switch.Unplug. Leaving cellphones, TVs, computers, and other electronic devices plugged in can continue to pull power from the grid. That can add up over
Your clients may want to request a loan officer to be present on closing day. It may make for a better settlement day, a survey shows.Loan officers aren’t required to attend a settlement, but when they don’t show up, borrowers tend to be less satisfied. When loan rates and fees are as expected but the loan officer does not come to the closing, borrowers’ satisfaction drops, according to the MortgageSAT’s National Benchmark, based on more
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