Author: Brad Beckett

According to the Census Bureau, the U.S. homeownerhip rate was 63.9 in Q3 of 2017 – which is nearly points lower than before the housing crisis.  However, there are some areas of the country where homeownership is growing…but where and at what pace?  That’s question Realtor.com set out to discover with their list of the nation’s top metros with the fastest growing homeownership rates. Interestingly, a little over half of the metros on their list have median prices well under the national median of $274,492. “‘Affordability is a strong draw to these areas,’ says Danielle Hale, chief economist at realtor.com.…

National apartment listing site ABODO recently reported that the median nationwide rent price increased slightly for December to $1,040 for a one-bedroom apartment, which is a 2.4% increase since the beginning of the year. The top three cities with the largest rent increases were: Newark, NJ (12.9%), Corpus Christi, TX (9.8%) and St. Paul, MN (7.4%).  The biggest decreases going into December were Columbus, OH (-8.3%), Madison, WI (-4%), and Santa Ana, CA (-3.7%).  San Francisco still tops their list at $3,253 for a 1-bedroom and $4,239 for a 2-bedroom apartment.  Indiana’s Ft. Wayne is at the bottom with $466 for…

According to the latest Yardi Matrix U.S. multifamily rents fell slightly for the second straight month, but they report that rates are stabilizing at moderate growth levels.  The average U.S. rent in November $1,358 (down $1).  However, year-over-year they increased 2.5%. The deceleration is largely caused by the wave of supply in those metros that might be worse if not for the construction labor shortage that has delayed projects by an average of four to five months. As a consequence, even though Yardi Matrix tracks about 600,000 units under construction nationally, only about 300,000 units will be delivered in 2017.…

The U.S. Census Bureau is reporting that total construction spending in October was estimated at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $1.24 trillion, 1.4% above September’s revised number and 2.9% higher than October, 2016. Through October, construction spending amounted to $1.029 trillion, 4.1% more than the same period in 2016. Click here to read more at Census.gov.

In their latest U.S. Home Equity & Underwater Report, ATTOM Data Solutions reports that in Q3 2017 there were over 4.6 million U.S. properties that were seriously underwater, down by more than 800k properties from the previous quarter and down by more than 1.4 million properties from Q3 2016 — the biggest year-over-year drop since Q2 2015.  In addition the report says there were over than 14 million properties (26.4% of all U.S. properties with a mortgage) that were equity rich which was down slightly from the Q2 but still up by 905k compared to one year ago. “Accelerating home…

Now that December is well underway Christmas will be here before you know it!  Our friends at The Home Depot out together this handy Christmas lights reference guide so you’ll know how many Christmas lights to purchase.  Happy Friday!!!! Hat tip to the Home Depot.

According to the Humane Society over 43 million households that have at least one cat.….That’s a lot of purring!  With that in mind, the folks over at Realtor.com crunched the catnip (we meant numbers) to come up with America’s Best Cities for Cat Lovers.  They looked at the percentage of listed homes with pet amenities, availability of pet services (groomers etc), veterinarians per capita, cat ownership rates, percentage of realtor.com rental listings that allow cats, and several other factors from 150 of the nation’s largest metros. The top ten cities are: Albany, NY Eugene, OR Seattle, WA Portland, ME Manchester,…

According to the latest S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller Indices, over the last 12 months home prices continued rising across the country.  The S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller U.S. National Home Price NSA Index, covering all nine U.S. census divisions, reported a 6.2% annual gain in September, up from 5.9% in August. Their 10-City Composite came in at 5.7%, up from 5.2% tin August. The 20-City Composite posted a 6.2% year-over-year gain, up from 5.8% the previous month.  Seattle, Las Vegas, and San Diego reported the highest year-over-year gains among the 20 cities.  Seattle led the way with a 12.9% year-over-year price increase, followed…

According to the latest Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) House Price Index (HPI) U.S. house prices rose 1.4% in Q3 of 2017.  Year over year, prices rose 6.5% from Q3 2016 to the third quarter of 2017.  In addition, FHFA’s seasonally adjusted monthly index for September was up 0.3% from August.  Their HPI is calculated using home sales price information from mortgages sold to, or guaranteed by, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. “With relatively favorable economic conditions and a continued shortage of housing supply, price increases in the third quarter were generally robust and widespread,” said Andrew Leventis, Deputy Chief…

Here’s a city list that might be good or bad depending on your propensity to consume adult beverages.  Financial news & opinion site 24/Wall St. recently reviewed data from the CDC (Centers for Disease Control & Prevention) to identify the metropolitan areas with the highest levels of binge & heavy drinking within each state. Next, they identified the “drunkest city” in each state for their report.  According to the report, excessive drinking claims the lives of tens of thousands of Americans each year and is responsible for about 1 in every 10 deaths among working age adults.  They also cited…