Tag Archives: Housing Supply

Prices rose and inventory declined in July on an annual basis, according to the State of the Real Estate Market report released Monday by Movoto Real Estate. However, on a monthly basis, inventory increased and list price remained the same, signifying the market is reaching equilibrium, according to Movoto. Movoto also said the steady list price from June to July is to be expected based on historical data. ""[T]he fact that prices did not increase from June to July is seasonal,"" Movoto said.

The CoreLogic Case-Shiller Home Price Indexes experienced a double-digit national price gain in Q1, a first since the housing bubble took place seven years ago. Prices increased an average of 10.2 percent from the first quarter of last year to the first quarter of this year across the 380 metro markets tracked. However, David Stiff, chief economist for CoreLogic Case-Shiller, does predict a slow-down in appreciation over the next year. From the first quarter of this year to the first quarter of next, the Case-Shiller Indexes predict a 6.5 percent price gain.

The number of households owning homes rose a scant 32,000 in the second quarter, but the homeownership rate remained at 65.0 percent, the lowest level in 18 years, the Census Bureau reported Tuesday. At the same time, the Census Bureau data showed the number of new household formations dropped dramatically in the first half of the year, an average of about 500,000 new households per month compared with 1.4 million new households per month in 2012.

While states in the Northeast have generally lagged behind the housing recovery seen in many other states across the nation, a few markets in the Northeast are beginning to look favorable, according to the Home Value Forecast released Thursday by ProTeck Valuation Services. In fact, in ProTeck's review of the top 200 core-based statistical areas (CBSAs) across the United States, the top two rankings went to CBSAs in the Northeast--Cambridge-Newton-Farmingham, Massachusetts and Providence-New Bedford-Fall River, Rhode Island-Massachusetts.

President Obama embarked this week on a series of speeches designed to highlight the nation’s continued economic stress. The immediate response and from both ends of the political spectrum was to decry his efforts as same-old, same-old. And, it is true the President has made this pitch before, emphasizing that the significant progress has made is not enough.

Low inventory coupled with rising mortgage rates and home prices are leading prospective buyers to consider using ""aggressive"" tactics such as overbidding to obtain a home, according to recent survey from Trulia. In order to secure the desired home, 25 percent of prospective buyers in the survey said they were willing to bid 1 to 5 percent above the seller's asking prices. When it came to overbidding, younger buyers (aged 18 to 34) are more likely to use the strategy. The survey also examined top worries and found rising mortgage rates weighed on the minds of 41 percent of potential buyers.

The seasonally adjusted annual rate of sales welled 8.3 percent in June to 497,000, according to a report from the Census Bureau and HUD. Economists surveyed by Bloomberg expected June sales to increase to 484,000 from May's originally reported 476,000. The median price of a new home fell 5.0 percent in June to $249,700, the third time the median price has dropped in the last four months. May's median price was revised down to $262,800 from the originally reported $263,900.

In the backdrop of a slow growing economy, Fitch Ratings projects the housing recovery will expand this year and the next-just not at an explosive pace, according to a report. The forecast for 2013 is for existing-home sales to increase 7.5 percent and for new home sales to rise by 22 percent. Meanwhile, single-family starts should grow 18 percent, and multifamily starts should jump 25 percent.

Existing-home sales fell 1.2 percent in June to an annual sales rate of 5.08 million as the price of a single-family home rose 13.5 percent from a year earlier--the strongest year-over-year gain since November 2005, the National Association of Realtors reported Monday. Economists surveyed by Bloomberg expected existing-home sales to jump to 5.27 million from May's originally reported sales pace of 5.18 million. The median price of an existing home rose $11,100 or 5.5 percent for the month to $214,200, the highest price since June 2008.

The nation's home builders celebrated Tuesday with the release of July's Housing Market Index, which showed a six-point jump in the measure of builder confidence on the heels of a seven-point jump one month earlier. In the last three months, confidence--as measured by the index--is up 16 points, or almost 40 percent. With giddy numbers like these, one would think builders would rush to break ground--or at least file the paperwork to do so, but they're not.