Denton County Real Estate

D.R. Horton New Home Orders Miss Expectations With Average Prices At 5-Year Low

Arlington-based D.R. Horton posted some mixed fiscal first quarter results today with the DFW homebuilder missing profit and sales order expectations. D.R. saw rising sales and revenue for the quarter, but even with a huge tax expense reduction and 4.1 million shares repurchased by the company, things didn't quite work out as well as the company might have anticipated. D.R. Horton closed 7 percent more homes in the latest quarter, 11,500, but net sales orders for the period ending in December rose only 3 percent to 11042 homes. That D.R. Horton was able to achieve [...]

NAR: Existing Home Sales Dropped 10.3% In December

Yesterday the National Association of Realtors told us existing home sales in the U.S. were down 10.3 percent compared to the same time a year ago. NAR's chief economist, Lawrence Yun, blamed the rise in mortgage rates. "The housing market is obviously very sensitive to mortgage rates. Softer sales in December reflected consumer search processes and contract signing activity in previous months when mortgage rates were higher than today. Now, with mortgage rates lower, some revival in home sales is expected going into spring." Yun is correct to a point, but still missing the bigger [...]

Dallas Fort Worth Employment Growth Still Solid, For Now

Dallas-Fort Worth employment numbers show that the DFW economy was still on solid footing in December. While local job growth has been slowing a bit, the economy has been rather resilient. Texas posted annual employment growth for 104 consecutive months in December 2018. The state unemployment rate stood at 3.7 percent. Unemployment in Texas was near record lows for a third consecutive month as we ended the year, and unemployment in the DFW area was lower than the state average at only 3.3 percent. With the recent slowdown in the economy, it will be interesting [...]

Hunter Ranch Cole Ranch Development Presented To Denton City Council

The Denton City Council received a detailed presentation from Hillwood and Stratford Land representatives during Tuesday work session. The proposed master-planned community of Hunter Ranch and Cole Ranch would encompass roughly 6000 acres and bring 15,000 new homes to the City of Denton, boosting Denton's housing stock by nearly 50 percent if the project were to be approved. A central question at the Denton City Council meeting was whether or not a special financing district or MMD (Municipal Management District) is the best path for the city to partner with developers Hillwood Communities and Stratford [...]

Denton TX Mortgage Rates Lowest In 9 Months

The benchmark 30-year mortgage interest rate dipped to 4.45 percent in the latest Freddie Mac weekly survey. That's the lowest level for mortgage interest rates that Denton Texas home buyers have seen in since last March. Not surprisingly, mortgage purchase applications have picked up slightly to start 2019. That's good news because purchase applications were trending lower for much of the fourth quarter of 2018 It remains to be seen whether the dip in interest rates will be enough to spark area home sales into the green. While mortgage rates are the lowest we've seen [...]

Lennar Homes Misses Q4 Sales & Order Estimates, KB Net Order Value Declines 21%

Lennar Homes posted higher revenue and income for the fourth quarter of 2018, but new home sales and orders for Lennar missed analyst estimates. Accounting for Lennar's absorption of CalAtlantic the company's 14,154 home sales still fell short of analyst estimates for 14,485. The bigger concern for Lennar is likely the 5 percent miss on orders which came in at 10,611 instead of the analyst estimate of 11,774. Lennar's gross margin on home sales for the quarter fell from 22.4% to 21.4% Operating margin softened to 13.5% Revenues for the quarter were bolstered by a [...]

Denton County Home Sales Continued Sliding In December

Denton County home sales continued their slide in December as the Dallas-Fort Worth real estate market saw a 5th consecutive month of year-over-year declining sales activity. Denton County experienced an 11 percent decline in closed home sales along with a corresponding 11 percent decline in pending home sales activity. The drop in forward-looking contract activity suggests that a spring housing rebound may be a tough proposition. Home prices were still rising in many DFW submarkets in December, including Denton Texas where the average price of a home rose 11 percent to $274,012. Looking at a [...]

Denton TX Rents End Year Slightly Lower, Leasing Activity Subdued

The average price of a single-family rental home in Denton  Texas was $1629 in December 2018. As the year came to a close single-family leasing activity was relatively flat compared to a year ago, with average prices that were slightly lower. Denton County experienced a 14 percent drop in leasing activity in December 2018, but prices were higher compared to last year. As the Dallas-Fort Worth real estate market enters 2019 in correction mode, it will be interesting to see how the residential lease market unfolds. For the time being average prices are still holding [...]

Dallas Fort Worth Real Estate Staring At Potential Bear Market

The Dallas-Fort Worth real estate market is looking at a bear of a problem. After the worst Christmas-Eve trading session in history for U.S. stock markets, time is running out for the wise guys on Wall Street to save indices from entering bear market territory. Looking at home prices and sales volumes in the DFW area, it would seem things are still running along fairly normally; however, it could be a mistake to assume the recent softness in home sales is just a blip in an otherwise stabilizing market. We could easily see a rally into [...]

Powell Continues FOMC’s Legacy Of Serial Arsonists

The Federal Reserve FOMC announced another Federal Funds rate hike, raising the target rate to 2.5 percent. That was widely anticipated. What the market did not like was a less-than dovish stance from Jerome Powell and his merry band of serial arsonists, as he stuck to the script that everything is awesome in the land of milk and honey. Aside from the drop in 10-year Treasury yields, there are important ramifications for the real estate market as the failures of Federal Reserve policy, and the consequences that come with it, become increasingly evident. Make no [...]

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