What are the best & worst states to make a living? The folks over at MoneyRates.com ran the numbers and ranked our fifty states based on these five factors; cost of living, workplace safety, state tax burdens, median wages and unemployment rates. Happy Friday!!! Hat tip to MoneyRates.com.
Author: Brad Beckett
Brad Beckett
Director of Education & Outreach, National Real Estate Investors Association
Great Photos Help Sell Real Estate by James F. Brown The old saying “a picture is worth a thousand words” is absolutely true. Great photos can help sell properties. But bad ones can drive potential buyers away before they even tour a property. Too many sellers and their agents give short shrift to photos. With just a little care and thought, anyone can take attractive real estate photos that entice buyers. Here are some tips for taking those photos: Plan your photo shoot. Think about what you want the photos to accomplish, what impression they’ll make on a potential buyer.…
According to the latest CoreLogic Home Price Index Report, home prices across the country rose 6.6% year over year for May and are up 1.2% from April. In addition, Corelogic predicts that home prices will increase by 5.3% on a year-over-year basis through May 2018. Key takeaways: Price Appreciation Outstripping Income Growth in Many Markets Many Markets Still Lack Adequate Inventory Tight Inventory Impacting Rental Markets “While the market is consistently generating home price growth, sales activity is being hindered by a lack of inventory across many markets. This tight inventory is also impacting the rental market where overall single-family…
The U.S. Census Bureau is reporting that total construction spending in May was estimated at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $1.2 trillion, which is 4.5% higher than May 2016. Private residential construction was at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $509.6 billion in May, 0.6% below April’s number. Nonresidential private construction was at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $433.6 billion in May, 0.7% below April’s estimate. Click here to read the full release.
A new report from RealPage and Axiometrics says apartment demand surged to a near-record volume in Q2 2017, saying essentially that occupancy is full and the annual pace of rent growth has stabilized. The report says apartment occupancy as of mid-year stood at 95% (which they say is essentially full performance). Rents for new-resident leases rose 1.8% during the second quarter. Nationally, monthly rent now averages $1,339. “Today’s strong demand for apartments reflects the combination of solid job formation, continued limited loss of renters to home purchase, and widespread availability of appealing new apartments,” said Greg Willett, chief economist for…
With inventories at record lows and home prices edging higher Realtor.com recently put out a list of the 20 hottest markets so far this summer. They looked at the nation’s biggest metro markets to determine which are buzzing with activity – in particular the number of listings at their time on the market. Red-hot California shamelessly dominates the list, however there are seven cities in the Midwest. “The housing market has now gone 24 months in a row seeing inventory drop on a yearly basis, the longest streak in over two decades,” said Javier Vivas, manager of economic research at…
As the oldest millennials are entering their mid-30’s they find themselves front & center in the U.S. housing market due to being the largest living generation of adults in America, today. But, are they finally moving from being predominate renters to homeowners? A recent study from apartment rental site ABODO looks at their buying patterns to see where they’re actually buying homes and where they’re not, as well as other interesting factors & data about this shape-shifting generation. Either way, we’re pretty sure this won’t be the last post on the matter. Some takeaways: Nationally, 32.1% of Millennials are homeowners…
Bad drivers are seemingly everywhere. And when pressed, we all probably consider ourselves good ones…right? Well, the folks over at QuoteWizard recently ran the numbers for America’s most 75 populous metros to see which has the best and worst drivers. They sampled incident stats from users of their website with over two million data points from 2016. The final rankings are sum of weighted means calculated from these parameters: Accidents, Speeding tickets, DUIs, and Citations (running a red light, using a cellphone while driving, etc.). The top 10 cities with the WORST drivers? Sacramento, CA Salt Lake City, UT Riverside,…
For the month of April, the S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller U.S. National Home Price NSA Index reported a 5.5% annual gain. Their 10-City Composite annual increase came in at 4.9% and their 20-City Composite posted a 5.7% year-over-year gain. Seattle led the way with a 12.9% year-over-year price increase, followed by Portland at 9.3%, and Dallas with 8.4%. Seven cities reported greater price increases in the year ending April 2017 versus the year ending March 2017. “The question is not if home prices can climb without any limit; they can’t. Rather, will home price gains gently slow or will they crash…
The National Association of Realtors said real estate is “the foundation of wealth building for the middle class and a critical link in the flow of goods, services and income for millions of Americans.” Indeed, and since it accounts for 19 percent of the nation’s GDP, it’s clearly a major driver of the U.S. economy. Happy Friday!
