The Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices Quarterly Market Report features the latest MLS data and local market statistics. Through year-over-year comparisons of key performance indicators and market summaries, this report delivers a comprehensive overview of residential real estate activity in Lane and Douglas Counties. Learn about trends affecting sales activity and price, read decisive takeaways for each market and empower yourself with Northwest Knowledge.
Existing home sales climb to record in June, U.S home seller profits rise to 36% in 2nd quarter, and home buyer purchase plans have not significantly changed because of COVID-19. We take a closer look This Week in Real Estate.
“The sales recovery is strong, as buyers were eager to purchase homes and properties that they had been eyeing during the shutdown. This revitalization looks to be sustainable for many months ahead as long as mortgage rates remain low and job gains continue.”
U.S. mortgage rates fall below 3%, breaking a 50-year record, builder confidence takes another massive jump and single family housing permits and starts were higher in June as housing demand and construction remain a bright spot for the economy. We take a closer look This Week in Real Estate.
Historically low interest rates top real estate news This Week in Real Estate! For the third time in 2020 the mortgage market has recorded a new historical low for interest rates, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association. Plus, home prices are still appreciating despite the effects of COVID-19 according to CoreLogic’s newly developed Pending Price Index. Click here to read more.
If you’ve been waiting for the market to recover before listing your house, now is a good time to start getting it ready. New information from the Mortgage Banker’s Association shows mortgage applications to purchase homes is on the rise. Plus, the S&P 500 reached a two-month high and the Nasdaq finished at its highest close in three months. And, homebuilder confidence is rebounding. Click here to read more This Week in Real Estate.
As several states begin the process of reopening following the COVID-19 pandemic, a new Lending Tree study released This Week in Real Estate shows Google searches for “homes for sale” grew by 54% to end the month of April, purchase activity was higher for the fourth consecutive week, and the fiscal stimulus is impacting consumer sentiment. Click here to read more about business impacting the real estate market this week.
We’re getting a better idea of how the worldwide coronavirus pandemic is impacting home sales as ATTOM Data Solutions releases its First Quarter Home Sales Report. Plus, a growing number of states are relaxing their social distancing protocols, but is it enough to cause the real estate market to thaw? And, homeownership rates are up despite the COVID-19 pandemic. We take a closer look This Week in Real Estate.
* U.S. Home Sellers Realized Average Price Gain of $67,100 in First Quarter of 2020. ATTOM Data Solutions released its First Quarter 2020 U.S. Home Sales Report Thursday, which shows that home sellers nationwide realized a home price gain of $67,100 on the typical sale, up from $66,264 in the fourth quarter of 2019 and up from $59,000 in the first quarter of last year. That $67,100 typical home-seller profit represented a 33.7 percent return on investment compared to the original purchase price, down from the post-recession high of 34.4 percent in the fourth quarter of 2019 but up from 32.8 percent a year ago. “The national housing market continued at full throttle in the first quarter of 2020, setting new price and profit records as it entered its ninth straight year of gains. After it looked like things were settling down last year, the market has again roared ahead, with significant increases,” said Todd Teta, chief product officer at ATTOM Data Solutions. “It is extremely important to note that the latest momentum is likely to hit a wall and reverse because of the drastic economic slowdown caused by the Coronavirus pandemic. Millions of Americans are newly unemployed, and most people are practicing social distancing, which could bring things to a halt just as the Spring buying season begins. Despite that cloud, the numbers for Q1 still do remain upbeat.”
* Home Purchase Applications Rise as Coronavirus Slowdown Begins to Thaw. With a growing number of states indicating over the last week that they are moving toward relaxing the social distancing protocols put in place to prevent the further spread of COVID-19, it appears that the real estate market may be beginning to thaw. In recent weeks, home purchase applications have declined sharply as people simply weren’t applying for mortgages. But that trend may be reversing, as new data from the Mortgage Bankers Association shows that home purchase mortgage applications recently rose to the highest level in nearly a month. “The news in this week’s release is that purchase applications, still recovering from a five-year low, increased 12% last week to the strongest level in almost a month,” said Joel Kan, MBA’s associate vice president of economic and industry forecasting.
* Homeownership Rate Up in the First Quarter 2020. According to the Census Bureau’s Housing Vacancy Survey (HVS), the U.S. homeownership rate reaches 65.3% in the first quarter 2020. This is 1.1 percentage points higher than the rate of 64.2% in the first quarter of 2019, but not statistically different from the previous quarter reading of 65.1%. Strong owner household formation with around 2.7 million homeowners added in the first quarter has driven up the homeownership rate, especially under the decreasing mortgage interest rates and strong new home sales and existing home sales in the first two months before the COVID-19 pandemic hit the economy. The HVS provides a timely measure of household formations – the key driver of housing demand. The housing stock-based HVS revealed that the number of households increased to 124.4 million in the first quarter of 2020, 2.0 million higher than a year ago.
As a marketing agent, I want to sell homes for more, not merely sell more homes. That’s why I focus on strategic pricing, negotiating, marketing and networking. My last listing went pending in less than a week, during the COVID-19 pandemic. If you’re interested in selling, let’s talk!
The Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) is suspending foreclosures and evictions for homeowners with a Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac-backed single family mortgage for at least 60 days due to the COVID-19 national emergency.
Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac (the Enterprises) and the Federal Home Loan Banks are taking steps to help people who have been impacted by the coronavirus. Fannie and Freddie are providing payment forbearance for borrowers impacted by the crisis, which will allow a mortgage payment to be suspended for up to 12 months by qualified borrowers.
If your ability to pay your mortgage is impacted, and your loan is owned by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac, you may be eligible to delay making your monthly mortgage payments for a temporary period, during which:
You won’t incur late fees.
You won’t have delinquencies reported to the credit bureaus.
Foreclosure and other legal proceedings will be suspended
This decision follows the U.S. Housing and Urban Development’s announcement earlier this month to halt foreclosures and evictions for FHA loans on single-family homes for 60 days due to COVID-19.
If you have any concerns about your mortgage contact your mortgage servicer (where you send your monthly mortgage payments).
You can visit the HUD and FHFA websites for more information.
According to the Census Bureau, HUD and Commerce Department This Week in Real Estate the market to start the year for newly built single-family homes experienced significant growth year-over-year. Permits in January reached their highest level since June 2007 and housing starts were 21.4% above January 2019. Below are a few highlights from the third week of February that influence our business:
* Housing Starts Mark a Solid Start in 2020. Relative to January 2019 total housing starts are 21.4 percent above the annual pace of 1.29 million units. The three-month moving average for single-family in January is an annual rate of 1,008,000 units, which is the highest pace since the Great recession. Single-family permits have registered a 20.2 percent gain compared to a year ago. This is in line with the NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index, which held builder confidence in the market for newly-built single-family homes at a solid level of 74 in February. Regional data show, on a year-over-year basis positive conditions for single-family construction in the West (+24.7 percent) and Midwest (+17.7 percent) while South (-3.7 percent) and Northeast (-15.4 percent) have posted declines.
* Single-Family Building Permits Rise to a 12-Year High. Permits for new houses rose to a more than 12-year high in January as builders began shifting into high gear amid a property shortage. Single-family home
authorizations, as permits are known, jumped to 987,000 at a seasonally adjusted annual pace, the highest since June 2007, the Commerce Department said on Wednesday. The January rate was a gain of 6.4% from December.Overall permits, including multifamily units and single-family homes, jumped 9.2% to an annual pace of 1.551 million, the highest level since March 2007.
* $221M Lost to Wire Transfer Fraud in 2019. Incidents and losses due to real estate wire fraud continue to increase, according to the FBI’s 2019 Internet Crime Report. The report shows there were 11,677 victims in 2019 with $221 million in losses. This compares to 11,300 reported victims and $150 million in losses in 2018. According to the FBI, only 15 percent of all wire fraud incidents are reported. Overall, the FBI reported that IC3 received 467,361 complaints in 2019 – an average of nearly 1,300 every day – and recorded more than $3.5 billion in losses to individual and business victims. The most frequently reported complaints were phishing and similar ploys, non-payment/non-delivery scams and extortion. The most financially costly complaints involved business email compromise, romance or confidence fraud, and spoofing, or mimicking the account of a person or vendor known to the victim to gather personal or financial information. Donna Gregory, the chief of IC3, said that in 2019 the center didn’t see an uptick in new types of fraud but rather saw criminals deploying new tactics and techniques to carry out existing scams. “Criminals are getting so sophisticated,” Gregory said. “It is getting harder and harder for victims to spot the red flags and tell real from fake.” While email is still a common entry point, frauds are also beginning on text messages—a crime called smishing—or even fake websites—a tactic called pharming. Individuals need to be extremely skeptical and double check everything, Gregory emphasized. “In the same way your bank and online accounts have started to require two-factor authentication—apply that to your life,” she said. “Verify requests in person or by phone, double check web and email addresses, and don’t follow the links provided in any messages.”
According to the Federal Reserve’s Flow of Funds report released This Week in Real Estate the value of U.S. owner-occupied homes increased to a record of $29.2 trillion in the third quarter of 2019. Home values rise as mortgage rates remain low. Fannie Mae believes the average fixed rate in 2020 will probably be 3.6% and if so, will be the lowest annual average ever recorded in Freddie Mac records going back to 1973. Below are a few highlights from the first full week of 2020…
* U.S. Home Values Rise to Record $29.2 Trillion, Fed Says. The value of all U.S. owner-occupied homes increased to a record $29.2 trillion in the third quarter, according to a Federal Reserve report known as the Flow of Funds. That was a gain of 4.2% from a year earlier, the slowest annualized increase since 2012. The collective value of U.S. homes is now 21% higher than the bubble peak reached in 2006. The Fed’s tally of home values for all U.S. residential real estate, whether occupied by homeowners or not, was $32.9 trillion, the report said.
* U.S. Mortgage Debt Hits a Record $15.8 Trillion. Outstanding U.S. mortgage debt rose to $15.8 trillion in the third quarter of 2019, according to the Federal Reserve. The biggest chunk of debt was held on homes, at $11.1 trillion, followed by commercial, with $3 trillion of loans, multifamily at $1.6 trillion and farms at $254.1 billion, according to the Fed data. Mortgage debt is rising as U.S. real estate values gain. Low mortgage rates boost real estate prices, and hence the volume of loans, because cheaper financing means buyers qualify for higher-balance mortgages and can bid more for properties they want. The average fixed rate probably will be 3.6% in 2020, which would be the lowest annual average ever recorded in Freddie Mac records going back to 1973.
* Homebuying Sentiment Up Sharply From 2018. Fannie Mae’s Home Purchase Sentiment Index (HPSI) finished out the year with little change from November to December, but with a strong increase over the December 2018 version. “The continued strength in the HPSI attests to the intention among consumers to purchase homes. This is consistent with the Fannie Mae forecast for 2020,” said Doug Duncan, Senior Vice President and Chief Economist. “The HPSI hit and remained near an all-time high in 2019, driven by the 16-percentage point year-over-year increase in the share of consumers believing it is a good time to buy. The HPSI’s strength supports our prediction of a healthy housing market in 2020, as well as consumers’ appetite and ability to absorb the expected increase in entry-level inventory.”
