Author: Brad Beckett

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics is reporting that the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U) was 0.5% in July, 2021.  Over the last 12 months, the all items index increased 5.4% before seasonal adjustment Click here to read the full release at the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Since Al Gore Invented the internet back in, ahem, whenever, sometime along the way the world wide web came in to being and since then there has been an absolute explosion of websites.  Today’s chart from Statista graphically illustrates the number of websites online since 1991.  Wow…1.88 billion sites….That’s a lot of real estate to surf…..  As always, stay safe and have a Happy Friday!! Hat tip to Statista.

A new report from Redfin says the median sale price prices of Mid-Priced and Affordable homes grew 16% and 13.2%, respectively, Most-Affordable homes rose 18.7%, with Luxury homes jumped 25.8% year over year in Q2 2021. “Home prices and sales plummeted at the beginning of the pandemic, but have now more than recovered—especially in the luxury and most affordable price tiers—due to low mortgage rates and strong homebuyer demand during the pandemic.”  Said Daryl Fairweather, Redfin’s Chief Economist Click here to read the full story at Redfin.com.

On a recent episode of Real Estate News for Investors, Kathy Fettke says competition is so fierce among homebuyers, that we’re seeing a surge in all-cash offers. In fact, a recent Redfin study said that all cash-offers are up almost 5% nationwide in the last year.  There are also a host of start-ups popping up that will help buyers make cash offers and they are expanding.  Cash is king… Click here to listen on Spotify.com.

The National Multifamily Housing Council (NMHC) says that 80.2% of apartment households made a full or partial rent payment by August 6th, 2021.  This figure is 0.9% higher than those who paid rent through August 6, 2020.  The data comes from the NMHC’s Rent Payment Tracker which uses data from 11.7 million professionally managed apartment units across the country – representing a wide variety of market-rate rental properties that can vary by size, type and average rental price. Click here to read more at the NMHC.

A landlord in North Carolina is frustrated that the eviction moratorium has not only cost him over $24k in unpaid rent, but he has also watched as one of his tenants bought three boats.  FOX News is reporting that the landlord (who owns 35 properties) has not only been forced to maintain his properties but even had to repair an air conditioner ($4,500) at the residence of the same tenant who purchased the watercraft. And, as has been previously reported on this site, of the $46 billion made available to the Emergency Rental Assistance Program, less than $3 billion has…

The Wall Street Journal says (reposted on Realtor.com) there is a looming legal battle coming over the CDC’s new eviction moratorium.  They reported that a group of property managers and realtors lodged objections in federal court to the new moratorium right after the new one was issued.  This group is supported by the National Association of Realtors and are alleging the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention lacked legal authority to issue new moratorium.  Interestingly, the Biden administration even acknowledged that it might be on tenuous legal footing when it told members of Congress (prior to enacting the new moratorium)…

The U.S. government is reporting that total construction spending in June was at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $1,552.2 billion, which is 0.1% above May’s revised estimate.  However, June’s figure was 8.2% higher than one year ago.  Residential construction was at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $763.4 billion in June, which is 1.1% higher than May’s revised estimate. Click here to read the full report at the U.S. Census Bureau.

Rentable says that the median nationwide rent price for one-bedroom units in June was $1,191 (up 2.5%) with two-bedroom units coming in at $1449 (up 2%).  Year-to-date, Rentable says one-bedrooms are now up 5.87% and two-bedrooms have gained 4.87%.  Be sure to check out their full data set of U.S. cities. “The pandemic has been a journey into the great unknown, and the coming months bring more questions than answers regarding nation median rent trends.” Click here to read the full report at Rentable.

While we’re quickly discovering that the Covid-19 pandemic is apparently not even close to being over, interestingly, the folks over at Statista remind us that last year’s recession (brought on by the pandemic) officially “is” over. Today’s infographic illustrates the length of all recessions since World War II and how they compare and stack up in duration. In fact, they point out that the recent pandemic-induced one was the shortest in U.S. history….Indeed. Stay safe and have a Happy Friday!!! Hat tip to Statista.