Housing Policy

housing policy

Denton County Housing Market – Calm Before the Storm?

The Denton County housing market experienced a temporary lift in the first two months of the year. February home sales bounced from the January lows putting them 15 percent higher than the same month last year. Pending sales were up 23 percent in February across Denton County. Median and average home prices bounced slightly during the month. The available supply of homes dipped to just 1.7 months. As more sellers and builders chopped prices in recent months, more buyers stepped back into the market. Percent of original list price has made marginal improvements for the past [...]

North Texas Housing Market Looks to Fed for Signs of Relief

The North Texas housing market continues to hope for a soft landing by the Fed. Agents and market participants continue to front-run a Fed pivot that hasn't happened. There are plenty of people in the real estate industry who want and need lower rates to bolster their business. Many of these same people are agents and levered speculators who feasted on the $trillions in stimulus that drove the markets to their bubble highs. Fortunately cooler heads are currently driving policy. Normalization in the housing market continues to trim some of the froth from the housing [...]

Demand Destruction Hitting Denton County Housing Market

Demand destruction continues to hit the Denton County housing market. The Federal Reserve's housing reset and tighter policy led to a 28 percent slide in home sales in November. Pending contracts for homes were down 24 percent from the same time a year ago. In reality sales numbers are softer than official estimates. We still have another 6 months or so before we'll see more accurate comparisons on sales totals with new construction sales consistently in the MLS. According to the Mortgage Bankers Association mortgage purchase applications are still running about 40 percent lower than [...]

Fannie Freddie Loan Limits For High Cost Counties Over a $Million in 2023

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac conforming loan limits will jump to over a $million in January 2023. American taxpayers will be backstopping loans in expensive coastal counties for up to $1,089,300. That's up from the limit of $970,800 this year. Most conforming loans will be subject to the new loan limit of $726,200 in 2023. That's a 12.2 percent increase from the current limit of $647,200. Fannie Mae's Lender Letter (LL-2022-06) explains the nuts and bolts of the new changes. The new tables have the loan limit for single-unit structures in Denton County Texas at [...]

Home Prices Are Falling – Time to Face Reality

North Texas home prices continued to fall in August. The post-pandemic housing bubble in the DFW area continues to deflate. The Fed is actively pushing for a housing reset. After facilitating reckless asset price inflation during the pandemic, taming inflation is now priority number one for the Powell Fed. Powell told us this week they will keep at it until the job is done. Denton County home sales were down 6 percent compared to August of last year. Pending sales slide even further, dropping 12 percent. With rates heading back toward 6 percent, activity and [...]

New Home Sales Take a Dive in July – 7.3 Months Supply of New Homes Under Construction

New home sales dropped sharply in July. High prices and dramatically higher mortgage rates have taken their toll on the new construction housing market. The median sales price of new houses sold in July 2022 came in at $439,400. The average sales price was $546,800. That rebound in prices was exactly what the new home market didn't need. New home affordability has been crushed with higher mortgage rates. "Sales of new single‐family houses in July 2022 were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 511,000, according to estimates released jointly today by the U.S. Census [...]

North Texas Housing Market – Summer of Denial

The North Texas housing market continued correcting in July. Closed sales were 15 percent lower for the DFW compared to July of last year. Pending contracts also slid lower by a corresponding amount. The median price of a home in the Dallas-Fort Worth market slipped to $389,000, up 16.1 percent year-over-year. Average prices in DFW dropped even more, sliding over $25,000 from the high in June. That may be the high for North Texas home prices for a few years depending on how this cycle plays out. The housing market correction has definitely been noticeable [...]

Who Benefits From the Financialization of Housing and Build-to-Rent?

There are countless real estate industry professionals and consultants floating ridiculous narratives regarding single-family rentals and build-to-rent. This is as good a time as any to debunk the "we're filling a need" nonsense. What we're really taking about here is the financialization of housing and the Cantillon Effect. If you are connected to the build-to-rent industry and collect a paycheck from the financialization of single-family housing, okay. No problem with that. Want to ignore the data and look the other way. No problem. It's easy to do. Just don't expect a thinking public with working [...]

New Home Prices Drop Sharply as Sales Hit a Wall

The Census Bureau reported new home sales for June at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 590,000 units. This was below expectations. The three previous months were revised lower as well. New home sales in June were 8.1 percent lower than May and 17.4 percent lower than the same time last year. The median price of a new home dropped to $402,400. The average sales price posted at $456,800. Those were the lowest prices for 2022. Average new home prices just crashed 19.8 percent ($112,500) from the April blow-off top this year according to Census [...]

Powell Fires Warning Shot at the Housing Market

This is a rough transcript of Jerome Powell's remarks on housing during this week's post-FOMC press conference. I apologize for any errors. Powell's remarks on housing come around the 1:51 mark toward the end of the press conference. See video below. It appears Jerome has finally figured out housing inflation is a serious headwind to the Fed's efforts to curtail raging inflation. It makes you wonder what they were looking at for the entirety of 2021 when the Powell Fed was pretending inflation was transitory. Question from Bankrate's Mark Hamrick: I Wonder what your assessment [...]

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