By: Dennis Norman
Today the S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices report was released which indicated that home prices in the 20 metro areas they report were down 19% in January from a year ago.
This drop in price is not surprising and only slightly higher than the 18.2% drop reported in December over the price year by Case-Shiller. Unfortunately, as I indicated in my post about that prior report, 18.2% set a record for the largest drop in the 21 year history of the report.
This reported drop in home prices is significantly higher than the drop of Read more…
By: Dennis Norman
Today the S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices report was released which indicated that home prices in the 20 metro areas they report were down 19% in January from a year ago.
This drop in price is not surprising and only slightly higher than the 18.2% drop reported in December over the price year by Case-Shiller. Unfortunately, as I indicated in my post about that prior report, 18.2% set a record for the largest drop in the 21 year history of the report.
This reported drop in home prices is significantly higher than the drop of 14.8% for the same period reported by the National Association of REALTORS. There are many reasons for this difference in the two reports, the primary one being the Case-Shiller report only covers 20 metro areas in the country. For a more detailed explanation of the difference in the two reports and the methodology used by Case-Shiller please see my earlier post on that topic.
By: Dennis Norman
Dennis Norman
Effective April 1, 2009, FHA will lower the amount you can borrow when refinancing your home loan if it is a “cash-out” refi. The term “cash-out” simply means you are borrowing more than your existing debt…thereby resulting in you getting “cash-out” of your home’s equity.
In the past FHA has allowed you to borrow up to 95% of the value on a cash-out refi but, effective April 1st, they will limit the loan to 85% of the value of your home.
Other requirements that FHA imposes on this type of refinancing include: Read more…
By: Dennis Norman
Dennis Norman
Many investors today are running into road blocks when it comes to financing. Many are finding that even though they have not experienced problems in the past, that now they are running into dead ends when it comes to financing.
Many bankers when quizzed about their sudden change in attitude about lending blame the regulators and say they have no choice.
So is this true? Or is it just an excuse?
To find the truth I went to the testimony of Timothy Long, the senior Read more…
By: Dennis Norman
According to a report issued by Freddie Mac 30-year fixed-rate mortgages have dropped to an average of 4.85% for the week ending March 26, 2009. Freddie Mac started doing the weekly survey of rates in 1971 and the rate has not been this low since then.
By: Dennis Norman
I am going to be cautiously optimistic about the housing data I’ve been seeing and say that if the trends continue maybe, just maybe, we are near the bottom.
I’m saying this because of the increase in existing home sales report that I wrote about yesterday and the report released this morning by the U.S. Department of Commerce showing the sale of New Homes in February increased 4.7% over January sales. For my complete story on this report see the post on Real Estate Consumer News.
While it is going to take more then one month of increased sales to make a meaningful trend I think the reports for February are very positive. Even if we are “nearing bottom” I don’t think we’ll see much appreciation for some time and instead will probably spend a fair amount of time plodding along on the bottom. This fact should allow investors ample opportunity however to take advantage of some of the attractive deals out there.
By: Dennis Norman
This morning the U.S. Department of Commerce released a report showing the sale of New Homes in February increased 4.7% over January sales but was still 41.1% less than a year ago.
It will take a lot more than this to conclude that we have “hit bottom” yet in the new home market but I think this is a positive sign and could be indicative of things to come.
The other positive news in this report was that the inventory of new homes continues to drop. Inventory was down to 330,000 new homes for sale at Read more…
By: Dennis Norman
Dennis Norman
Yesterday the National Association of REALTORS(R) released its existing home sales report for February and it contained some good news. According to the report existing home sales in the U.S. increased 5.1% in February over January although the rate is still down 4.6% from the same time last year.
Granted it takes more than one month of good news to show a positive trend but maybe we are getting close. Median home prices in the report were looking as if there may be some stability coming as well. For complete details please see my post on the real estate consumer blog, Real Estate Consumer news.
By: Dennis Norman
Dennis Norman
Yesterday the National Association of REALTORS(R) released its existing home sales report for February and it contained some good news. According to the report existing home sales in the U.S. increased 5.1% in February over January although the rate is still down 4.6% from the same time last year.
The Northeast region of the country fared the best with a 15.6% increase in sales over January. However the Northeast region had the most sales to make up…In the January 2009 report the Northeast region had the biggest one year decline in sales at 23.8% below the prior year. After the increase in sales for February the Northeast still leads the country in terms of biggest one year decrease in sales at 14.9% but is headed the right direction. What doesn’t make sense is that the median home price in the region actually increased 10.6% to $251,200 from $227,000 the month before which puts prices in the past year down only 4.8%, the lowest of the four regions. This is contrary to my prior comments about the region, citing the increased sales in the west along with lower prices and suggesting prices needed to come down in the Northeast to stimulate sales. Well, sales have been stimulated and prices went up. Go figure. It takes a couple of months to really establish a trend however so we’ll watch and see what happens. Maybe the Northeast is going to come out of this better than the rest of the country? Read more…
By: Dennis Norman
This morning I received a press release from Move, Inc., the company that operates Realtor.Com for the National Association of REALTORS(R), with a headline that read “One in Five Americans Plan to Buy a Home Despite Economic Conditions.” After all the bad news about housing I have seen I was elated to see something positive! I thought to myself; WOW! Is this good news or what? It’s time to jump back into residential development! I better start calling all my developer buddies and tell them it is time to get off the couch and get back to building new homes!
As I was at the height of my euphoria something suddenly didn’t feel right. Read more…
