Market Studies

Integrated Asset Services LLC (IAS), an REO management and disposition company based in Denver, Colorado, released its IAS360 House Price Index for September 2008. The monthly report showed a 2.1 percent decline in house prices on a national level in September, with an annual decline of 13.

Home values in the United States posted their seventh consecutive quarterly decline, falling 9.7 percent year-over-year to a Zillow Home Value Index of $202,966, according to the third quarter Zillow Real Estate Market Reports released today.

Craig Long LLC, a real estate law firm with offices in Cumming and McDonough, Georgia, announced today that Ashley Carroll has joined the firm as an associate attorney. In this role, Carroll will conduct closings and handle other general legal practice matters for the firm’s McDonough office.

Five financial trade associations released the results of an industry survey yesterday which examined more than 400 firms’ views of participation in the federal government’s Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP).

Pending home sales in September fell on the heels of a strong gain a month earlier as credit tightened and economic conditions deteriorated, according to the National Association of Realtors (NAR). The association released its Pending Home Sales Index (PHSI) today, which is a forward-looking indicator based on contracts signed in September.

According to information released today from MORTECH LLC, a company that has provided research on lender attitudes and behavior and their use of technology for the last twenty years, early returns to the MORTECH 2008 survey show lenders overwhelmingly agree that the federal government had good reason to intervene in the operations of government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs) Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac when it stepped in and took conservatorship of the two companies on September 7 of this year.

Borrowers who took out mortgages in the first half of 2008 showed a strong preference for fixed rate mortgage products due to a decrease in fixed mortgage rates and the continued tightening of lending standards, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA’s) Mortgage Originations Survey released today.

The number of vacant residential properties for sale inched up to 2.23 million units in the third quarter of 2008 from 2.1 million units in the second quarter, according to a Census Bureau report released last week.

The Federal Reserve released its quarterly survey on lending practices yesterday, and it showed that 95 percent of banks have tightened their lending standards on at least some forms of loans. The survey of 55 domestic banks and 21 U.

Months of government bailouts and stock market volatility brought Americans’ perception of the values of their own homes closer to reality than it was last quarter, but surprisingly half of U.S. homeowners still believe their home is insulated from the nation’s home value declines, according to the Zillow Q3 Homeowner Confidence Survey.