Housing Policy

housing policy

Existing Home Sales Lowest In 3 Years With 4.1% September Drop

The National Association of Realtors reported the lowest levels for existing U.S. home sales in 3 years. Sales of existing homes posted at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5,115,000 for September, down from August numbers which were also revised lower. The year-over-year decline in existing home sales of 4.1 percent puts sales levels back to where they were three years ago. Existing home inventory at 1.88 million homes was up slightly from last year's 1.86 million units. NAR's chief economist, Lawrence Yun, indicated that "higher interest rates have led to a decline in sales [...]

LGI Homes’ Beaver Creek In Denton TX A Haven For Wall Street Landlord

The quiet little community of Beaver Creek on the north side of Denton Texas offers a perfect portrait of what's wrong with the current housing market in the United states. Beaver Creek is an LGI Homes community that specializes in affordable starter homes priced in the mid to upper $200's. Having viewed the community earlier this year, I was interested to see how sales would progress since Denton Texas is a popular destination for DFW home shoppers looking for affordable homes. Denton home prices are generally more affordable than the average prices in the Dallas-Fort [...]

Hoisington Q3 Update – Deflationary Wave Of Debt Will Stifle Yields

The deflationary wave of debt growing within multiple facets of the U.S. economy will stifle yields. That's the gist of Van Hoisington and Lacy Hunt's latest third quarter Review and Outlook. As the market was puking on the latest surge in Treasury yields above 3%, I couldn't help but notice that the publicly traded homebuilders were getting crushed yet again. With the Freddie Mac 30-year mortgage rate touching 4.9 percent this week (levels not seen in 7 years), things were getting even uglier for the housing sector. There was nowhere to hide this week if [...]

Denton TX Residential Lease Market Squeezing Renters

Single-family rents in Denton Texas continue squeeze local renters, and it comes at a time when average home prices are near record highs. For those looking to lease a home this past summer, the available rental options were more expensive than ever. As Denton TX home prices were shooting to record highs this year, the summer demand for single-family lease homes rose like the North Texas triple degree temperatures. During the month of August lease activity in Denton rose 65% year-over-year with the average price of a Denton rental hitting $1599 per month in the [...]

Existing Home Sales Soften As New Home Permits Stall

Today the National Association of Realtors reported that existing home sales for August came in flat from last month, actually down about 1.5% from this time last year. The median price of an existing home sold in the U.S. during the month of August posted at $264,800, a rise of 4.6 percent year-over-year and the 78th consecutive month of year-over-year price gains. According to NAR chief economist, Lawrence Yun, "homes continue to fly off the shelves" with most properties selling within a month. The supply of existing homes in the United States rose to 4.3 [...]

10 Years After The Housing Crash, Dallas-Fort Worth Experiencing Consequences Of Policy Failures

10 years after the housing crash and the Great Recession that nearly brought the world economy to its knees, the adults in the room are still pretending that everything is normal. If you read the Dallas Morning News and the spin of many professional economists, the DFW real estate market has emerged from the wreckage 10 years ago relatively unscathed. With DFW home prices at record highs, most housing pundits are eager to suggest everything is awesome. Apparently the recent rise in home inventories is just blip in an otherwise normalization of the formerly red [...]

New Home Builders Clipped By Weak Order Growth

New home builders had a relatively rough week with several major publicly-traded builders experiencing some nasty haircuts in their stock prices. With the exception of DR Horton, it wasn't a good week for home builder stocks. While Facebook and Twitter were seeing record drops in their share prices, new home builders were also experiencing a hangover from weak growth in new home orders. The Dow Jones Home Construction Index has trended lower for most of the year, down almost 18 percent year-to-date. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to understand why the index peaked just [...]

RECenter A&M Economists Still Wasting Texas Realtors’ Money

RECenter at A&M economists and data junkies are still wasting the dues of Texas Realtors that pay a good chunk of their salaries. It seems the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M economists are phase-locked in a myopic pursuit to somehow rationalize or justify the status quo situation with Texas housing. "Intellectual Phase-Locking is a condition that results when dogmatic 'scientific' assumptions inhibit further inquiry." Rupert Sheldrake Last year I wrote about some of the interesting details on the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M and their funding. I have also clued readers in on the [...]

Autopsy Report For Affordable Housing In Dallas Fort Worth

An autopsy report for affordable homes in Dallas-Fort Worth reveals the steady evaporation of affordable housing inventory in the DFW area. Recent data show that housing prices in the U.S. are currently at their least affordable levels since the financial crisis. The latest numbers on existing home sales showed that the median price of a home hit a new all-time high. So how did this all happen? Was it an accident? Is it due to our smashingly great economy? Let's find out. As investors and speculators have gobbled up lower-priced homes across the country to [...]

April Existing Home Sales Soften 2.5%

The National Association of Realtors reported a 2.5 percent slide in existing home sales for April. That translates to a 1.4 percent decline compared to last year. According to NAR the median price of an existing home sold in April was $257,900, a rise  of 5.3 percent compared to last year. The average price of an existing home was $297,300, an increase of 3.3 percent compared to last year. NAR chief economist, Lawrence Yun, blamed low inventory for the sluggish April sales... “The root cause of the underperforming sales activity in much of the country [...]

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