Tag Archives: Home Prices

If two professors at Columbia Business School have anything to say about it, 30 million homeowners across the country would refinance their mortgages and stabilize the lagging housing market in the process. The duo recently proposed the refi boom in a paper that aimed to prop up sagging home prices and accelerate job growth nationally. The academes, R. Glenn Hubbard and Chris Mayer, propose reducing mortgage rates by about one percent to encourage a boost in home prices and the housing recovery.

Once the star of the American Dream, homeownership has fallen on hard times, a victim of the financial crisis and wary homeowners. With home sales at record lows despite rock-bottom mortgage rates and home prices, some say a country once beholden to the mortgage note is now a nation at the behest of landlords. The story sets up a classic whodunit, begging the question: Who set up homeownership to take the fall? Apartment vacancies continue to plummet alongside home prices around the country.

Mortgage giant Freddie Mac released an economic outlook Tuesday that portrays the housing economy as one cramped by recent turmoil, with less-than-favorable signs for a recovery despite historically low interest rates and home prices. Comparing the economy to a roller coaster, the outlook forecasts a long ride ahead for a gasping recovery, with interest rates and home prices sure to remain low. The outlook cites employment numbers, economic growth, mortgage rates, and home prices.

Volatile markets and low home sales are colluding to force mortgage rates to historic lows and sellers to mark off home prices, making actual home purchases less expensive than renting in cities across the United States. Buying a home fell below renting costs in 74 percent of the country's 50 largest cities over July, with 12 percent of cities seeing higher price tags for apartments than for houses, according to real estate Web site Trulia. Bottom line: Peak numbers for home affordability make closing on rates a better deal.

The market remains a dim one for new single-family homes, according to an index jointly released by Wells Fargo and the National Association of Home Builders. The index registered confidence at 15 on a 0-to-100 scale, staying largely the same since July. The low confidence follows a hit taken by homebuilding companies in the stock market last week. Analysts and economists weighed in with MReport about how slowing momentum in home construction and sales, as reflected by homebuilder confidence, impacts job creation and consumer confidence.

Manic markets at home and fiscal crises overseas sent investors scurrying last week to buy up Treasury debt, a trend that sent mortgage rates plunging. Experts say the low mortgage rates are unlikely to boost sales.

CoreLogic was the bearer of some positive housing market news recently, with its announcement that home pricing is on the rise for the third consecutive month. Data from CoreLogic indicates that the results from its Home Price Index for June demonstrate a 0.7 percent increase in the market, building on similar statistical improvements recorded in May and April. CoreLogic notes that pricing is still depressed by 6.8 percent compared to last year's numbers.

Citing dips in home sales, purchases, and low job growth, some economists say housing is already in a double-dip recession, with reprieve still off for another two years - this despite a last-minute debt deal.

Canada may soon face a housing bubble crisis not unlike the one still felt by its southern neighbor, with a possible burst threatening to soak pockets of the U.S. economy that rely on purchases by overseas homebuyers.

Is it really a buyers├â┬ó├óÔÇÜ┬¼├óÔÇ×┬ó market? Not according to recent survey results from J.D. Power and Associates, which demonstrated that sellers are more content than buyers in the current real estate market. The study looked at three key areas of the home-buying process: real estate agents, real estate offices utilized, and auxiliary services. Buyers positivity dropped by around 1 percent between 2010 and 2011, and the decrease is attributed to a 14 point drop in real estate agent satisfaction numbers.