As home prices increase at a much slower pace than they have been over the last few years, potential homebuyers may have found their opportunity to enter the housing market as homes become more affordable.
Fannie Mae’s Home Purchase Sentiment Index showed that consumers' home price expectations are the lowest they have been since late 2012, which could provide first-time homebuyers a chance to purchase a home in a calmer market. The index increased 1 point 2 points to 82 point 7 in February 2016. According to Fannie Mae, 33 percent of survey respondents said home prices will go up, up 4 percentage points.
The issue that has been at the center of debate among banks for some time is whether or not property evaluations are sufficient substitutions for appraisals when determining the value of a home for real-estate-related financial transactions. The federal banking regulatory agencies, including the Federal Reserve Board, Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., recently issued an advisory bulletin to identify expectations for the use of property evaluations by banks.