Texas Real Estate

Caveman Powell Looking To Levitate Stock, Housing Bubbles

Yesterday the Federal Reserve yelped like a whipped puppy as Jerome Powell turned into the latest iteration of his market-dependent Bernanke/Yellen/Greenspan predecessors. If you remember, Mr. Powell was here in the DFW area back in November playing up the fabulous state of the U.S economy and the Fed's wonderful policies. At the time expectations were that the Fed would be raising the Federal Funds rate four more times this year with a balance sheet reduction schedule that was supposedly on "autopilot" to the tune of $50 billion per month rolling off. Flash forward one quarter [...]

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 [...]

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 [...]

False Narratives About The Housing Market Refuse To Die

False narratives about the U.S. housing market refuse to die. Mainstream media and real estate industry shills continue to deflect attention from the complex, but at the same time rather simple reasons behind the lack of housing affordability. Politico author, Lorraine Woellert, offers us a perfect example of everything that is wrong with the U.S. housing market, including the mainstream media reporting on it. I hadn't come across this piece previously, but having  now read it, there are a number of red flags that are worth calling out. Woellert seems appropriately concerned that only wealthy [...]

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 [...]

Trendmaker Homes Comes To Dallas Via TRI Pointe Acquisition of Dunhill

California based TRI Pointe Group is expanding its Texas footprint by purchasing Dallas-based Dunhill Homes for a reported $60 million. Dunhill Homes operates in the Dallas-Fort Worth market under the Dunhill and Nathan Carlisle Homes brands. Effective January 1st, Dunhill will begin operating under the Trendmaker Homes brand. Trendmaker Homes was previously part of Weyerhaeuer before the Houston area builder was acquired by TRI Pointe several years ago. Trendmaker builds a number of affordable luxury homes in the Houston and Austin markets. With the absorption of Dunhill Homes, TRI Point will acquire Dunhill's assets, and [...]

Denton County Home Prices Drop As DFW Sees Worst Sales In 7 Years

Denton County home prices slid 2 percent in November as the DFW housing market experienced the worst sales decline in 7 years. The good news is that the sales volume estimates in the official press releases are now more reflective of reality. The bad news is that actual home sales in Dallas-Fort Worth are still rather soft. Home sales in Denton County dropped 9 percent in November, in line with the 8 percent decline seen for DFW. Pending home sales in Denton County slid 3 percent compared to the same time a year ago, slightly [...]

Dallas Morning News Real Estate Desk Continues Comedy Of Errors

The Dallas housing market isn't dead, but real estate editor, Steve Brown, continues floating more comical real estate industry spin to minimize what's going on with the Dallas-Fort Worth housing market. Mr. Brown's latest article about overdone expectations caught my attention. He's right that the truth is usually not as bad as those screaming fire. The DFW housing market certainly isn't dead. As I have explained, it is just beginning to deflate. I'm not sure where Mr. Brown is getting his forecast for a 1 percent decline in home sales next year, but I certainly [...]

By |2018-12-05T12:42:09+00:00December 4th, 2018|Texas Real Estate|0 Comments

October New Home Sales Collapse, Near Three-Year Low

The Census Bureau numbers for October new home sales posted at a seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR) of 544,000 units. This was way below expectations of a 575,000 print, and near a three-year low. As I have been detailing for much of the year, much of that "pent-up demand" that you hear real estate industry mouthpieces talking about is a giant work of fiction, a tired marketing ploy that the media, economists and Realtors have been using in attempt to justify grossly inflated home prices across the U.S. Well, it appears the cat is officially [...]

Denton County Existing Home Sales Decline 11% In October

Denton County existing home sales declined 11 percent in the month of October. Sales of existing single-family homes were a bit softer still. Pending sales of existing resale single-family properties in Denton County currently show an 18 percent decline for October.  These updated NTREIS figures for Denton County Texas show that the correction in the North Texas real estate market is still in play. We are nearing the end of the month following the official press release, so don't expect any significant improvements to the numbers. As I mentioned in my October housing market report, [...]

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