DFW Real Estate

Balance Sheet Unwind Hits Reverse As Interest Paid To Banks Soars

True to form, the Federal Reserve is taking a rather cautious approach to their balance sheet unwind with this week's System Open Market Account (SOMA) report showing an INCREASE of a $million in the Fed's bloated account holdings. So much for unwinding!  If you were wondering how equity markets could be marching to new highs every week in the face of tepid organic economic growth, you have your answer. Today's inflation numbers show that the Federal Reserve still can't seem to generate any inflation in the economy, with core inflation rising only 1.8% year-over-year. Home [...]

The Truth About DFW Housing Demand

The Dallas Morning News real estate desk just floated an interesting piece on housing demand in the DFW real estate market. According to the regurgitated Zillow source, almost 40 percent of Dallas area homes sold for more than asking price last year, and the median amount buyers paid over asking price was 5.7 percent or $12,023. Fortunately we have data from the North Texas Real Estate Information System to do a quick fact-check on this story. As it turns out Zillow's story doesn't hold water. Looking at the source of the Zillow story showing buyers chomping [...]

Another Fed “Senior Economist” Demonstrates Willful Ignorance

The Federal Reserve and its army of economists continue to demonstrate willful ignorance of their failed policies. This week it was the Kansas City Fed's Jordan Rappaport who penned another dose of misdirection on the housing market. Rappaport's piece, "Pent-Up Demand and Continuing Price Increases: The Outlook for Housing in 2018" is yet another example of how the Federal Reserve touts itself as a champion of real economy while they continue toe the line for Wall Street and wealthy investors. In the usual captured culture of Fed Mr. Rappaport lays out the theme of continued [...]

Denton County Home Rental Prices Stagnate

Single-family rental prices in Denton County were basically flat during December. As home prices have continued to creep higher in the area, average rents for single-family homes in Denton County are not as strong. Prospective renters are likely getting stretched with home price inflation exceeding average wage growth. This would help to explain why the average price of home rented in Denton County in December 2017 dropped about 2 percent compared to December 2016. The average price per square foot for a rental in Denton County did rise slightly, but the average size of homes [...]

Misguided Expectations For Inflation And Bond Yields In 2018

The Federal Reserve has proven they are devoid of credibility when it comes to their advertised mandates of full employment and price stability. What the Fed is good at is the same thing it has always been good at...blowing bubbles and serving the interests of Wall Street banks. Thus it should come as no surprise that many of the clueless PhD economists working for the Federal Reserve are calling for an uptick in inflation in 2018. You know, because the labor market is so "tight" and current inflation is still tepid. The Fed of course [...]

Denton County Real Estate 2018: All Eyes On The Fed

As we embrace the new year, and the freezing temperatures that arrived with it, Denton County real estate prices continued to climb higher as sales continue to grow at a measured pace. The housing boom seen during the last 4-5 years has been impressive by any standards. As the Fed continues its much anticipated balance sheet "normalization", there is a lot at stake for local real estate markets.  The U.S. housing market is now heavily dependent on Fed stimulus, in the form of artificially depressed mortgage interest rates, and the artificial "wealth effect" created by [...]

Fed Balance Sheet Unwind Proceeding At Snails Pace

The balance sheet unwind for the Federal Reserve is proceeding at a snails pace. After a rather large jump in the securities holdings last week, we should have seen a resumption in the balance sheet shrinkage. Interestingly the Fed's holdings of Treasury and mortgage securities only fell by $4.8 billion this past week. A look at the weekly System Open Market Account Holdings shows there is a lot of work to do in the last week of the year if the Fed is going to stick to it's stated unwind schedule. While the Fed has [...]

Tax “Reform” Makes Denton County Property Taxes Even Less Appealing

The Tax Cuts And Jobs Act was signed into law this week, and a significant portion of your Denton County property taxes may no longer be deductible under the new law in 2018. Aside from being one of the worst researched and most ill-conceived pieces of legislation in modern history, the new tax bill is very favorable to corporate America. Unfortunately the new tax "reform" is not exactly friendly to home ownership. It remains to be seen how the new tax law will affect DFW area home prices, but the new rules certainly don't favor [...]

New Home Sales Soar In November Despite Higher Prices

New home sales jumped 26.6 percent compared to November of last year. The Census Bureau reported that new home sales for November posted at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 733,000. This was well above expectations, and a 17.5 percent increase from the revised October numbers. Before you get too excited however, it's important to realize that the Census numbers are highly volatile and subject to significant revisions. The previous three months of new home sales were all revised lower, so expect some revisions to this November spike as well. The median price of a [...]

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