Texas Home Prices

Average New Home Size Continues To Shrink

The National Association of Home Builders reported that the median and average size of a new home in the U.S. continued to decline in the third quarter. Third quarter numbers on housing starts show that the median single-family new home size was 2,378 square feet.  The average square footage for new single-family homes declined to 2,518 square feet. According to the NAHB, this is apparently just part of the normal housing cycle. "The post-recession increase in single-family home size is consistent with the historical pattern coming out of recessions. Typical new home size falls prior to and during a [...]

QE Or Bust – US Yield Curve Continues To Flatten

Behold the flattening U.S. yield curve! Reading through the latest Quarterly Report on Household Debt and Credit, you might get the impression that things are still humming along just fine. After all total household debt just hit a new high in the latest survey posting at $12.96 trillion. Mortgage debt is still below the previous bubble peak, so home buyers would appear to be doing doing just fine. If you peak below the headline metrics, however, you begin to see some cracks in the "everything is awesome" narrative. One of the first things that stands [...]

DFW Home Prices Pushing Limits Of Affordability

DFW home prices have been on a tear during the last 5 years. That begs the question of whether the recent price gains are sustainable. The answer to that inquiry generally boils down to who is selling what. In our hyper-financialized housing market it is not surprising when real estate practitioners or lenders suggest that we are not in a housing bubble. Whether you call it a housing bubble or not, there is no denying that the past decade has seen some dramatic shifts in the real estate market. Dallas/Fort Worth is certainly part of [...]

New Home Sales Get Hurricane Boost

New home sales rose 17 percent in September compared to the same month last year. Census estimated new home sales for September at a seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR) of 667,000 in September. The median price of a new home contracted in September was $319,700 while the average price of a new home contracted in September stood at $385,200. Both figures represent increases from last year's prices. The supply of new homes decreased to 5 months in September, a slight decrease from the 5.1 month supply level at this time last year. The rise in [...]

Dallas Home Prices Challenge Builders

Dallas home prices are expensive, and builders are finally getting the message. That's the news from the most recent data on home starts in the DFW area, which reportedly surged in the 3rd quarter. Builders reportedly started 8,853 single-family homes in the DFW metroplex. For the 12 months ending in September there were apparently 32,234 permits recorded. This was the highest total in a decade. More interestingly, builders' starts for houses under $500,000 rose by 14.5% during the past year. Builders are finally waking up to the fact that the Dallas Fort Worth housing market [...]

New Home Sales Cool 1.2% In August

The Census Bureau reported that new home sales fell 1.2% year-over-year in August. As we saw last week with the existing home sales decline, Hurricane Harvey put a damper on real estate transactions in the southern states. It is quite likely that September home sales will also be affected by the fallout from Harvey. The median price of a new home contracted in August was $300,200 during the month of August. The average price of a new home contracted last month was $368,100. Both figures represent price increases from a year ago. Median new home [...]

Foreign Buyers Still Flooding U.S. Real Estate Market

The the volume of foreign buyers buying U.S. residential real estate rose dramatically during the latest 12-month survey from the National Association of Realtors. The 2017 Profile of International Activity in U.S. Residential Real Estate shoes that the dollar volume of purchases by foreign buyers rose from $102.6 billion in 2016 to $153 billion in the latest 12-month period ending in March. In all, foreign buyers purchased 284,455 U.S. residential properties accounting for 5 percent of existing home sales and 10% of existing home sales by dollar volume. If you were wondering what's been driving the [...]

New Home Sales Rebound In May

The Census Bureau reported a rebound for new home sales in May. New residential home sales posted at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 610,000. This was 2.9 percent higher than the revised April numbers and 8.9 percent higher than a year ago. The median price of a new home contracted in May was $345,800 while the average new home price in May came in at $406,400. Just like we saw with existing home sales this week, median home prices hit a new all-time high. New home sales volume, while up from last month, is [...]

Rent vs Buy In Texas? Don’t Ask Trulia

The Houston Chronicle's real estate desk offered up another dose of "fake news" when they regurgitated Trulia's latest edition of rent vs buy calculations. In Layman's terms Trulia's rent vs buy calculations are essentially worthless when it comes to Houston Texas. It's amazing that Houston's largest newspaper would even reference them. They are really that bad. I can only assume that our largest newspaper would rather sell ads than tell people the truth. The truth is that it's not 42 percent cheaper to buy a home in Houston than it is to rent one. Let's [...]

NAR: Existing Home Sales Slip 2.3% In April

Existing home sales for April slipped 2.3 percent according to The National Association of Realtors. This comes on the back of the sharp correction in new home sales reported yesterday by the Census Bureau. Existing home sales for April posted at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.57 million units. While down from the previous month, this was roughly 1.6 percent higher than last year. Lawrence Yun, NAR's chief economist, pegged the sales softness on a lack of affordable homes...  "Homes in the lower- and mid-market price range are hard to find in most markets, [...]

Go to Top