Author: Brad Beckett

We first heard about this property back in the Fall after a Maryland couple with a bank contract to buy a vacant foreclosed home went to move in, but there was rental truck in the driveway moving someone else in!  When the new owners confronted the people moving in, the men showed them what they said was a lease for the property.  According to a recent report on FOX News, the property is still being occupied by squatters and the issue has become a growing problem nationwide. FOX says homeowners all across the nation are being tormented by squatters and…

Rentcafe says the rising demand for rentals is affecting the size of newly built apartments in a negative way.  They point out that in 2022, the average apartment size was 887 square feet – which is 54 square feet less than 2012.   Interestingly, the sharpest drop took place in 2022, when the average size went from 917 to 887.  One of the reasons they give for the drop in sizes is that more studios and one-bedroom apartments entered the market in 2022, reaching a historic market share of 57%. “Notably, last year’s decrease comes after the two pandemic years,…

According to the latest Federal Housing Finance Agency’s (FHFA) House Price Index (HPI), U.S. house prices rose 5.3% from January 2022 through January 2023.  Month to month, house prices were up 0.2% from December, 2022.   The FHFA HPI is the nation’s only collection of public, freely available house price indexes that measure changes in single-family home values based on data from all 50 states and over 400 American cities that extend back to the mid-1970s. “U.S. house prices changed slightly in January, continuing the trend of the last few months…Many of the January closings, on which this month’s HPI is…

Rental information site Zumper recently released their latest monthly National Rent Report for March, 2023.  According to their data, rent for 1-bedroom apartments was $1,494 (up .02% from February) and the median two-bedroom rent was $1,833 (up 0.5% from February).  Zumper says this uptick points to a larger trend of deceleration of price increases and a gradual return to seasonality.  Be sure to check out their list of the top 100 metro areas. “…the rental market continues to inch towards normal…This new reality is emerging thanks to a number of dueling forces. Rental supply is up in many markets thanks…

In late March, a federal judge in in Northern Illinois said home sellers accusing the National Association of Realtors (and a group of real estate brokerages) of conspiring to inflate commission rates can move forward as a class action lawsuit.  According to a report from Reuters, U.S. Judge Andrea Wood, of the Northern District of Illinois, granted class-action status to past home sellers seeking more than $13 billion in damages and creates a separate class of current and future sellers who want a court injunction that bars subsequent violations of U.S. antitrust law. The lawsuit challenges a requirement that sellers…

The National Association of Realtors is reporting that pending home sales were up 0.8% in February, 2023 –  the third month in a row.  The NAR’s Pending Home Sales Index (a forward-looking indicator based on contract signings) increased to 83.2 in February.  The NAR says the affordable U.S. regions  (Midwest & South) are leading a recovery.  Indeed… “After nearly a year, the housing sector’s contraction is coming to an end…Existing-home sales, pending contracts and new-home construction pending contracts have turned the corner and climbed for the past three months.”  Said the NAR’s Chief Economist, Lawrence Yun. Click here to read…

The latest S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller U.S. National Home Price NSA Index reported a 3.8% annual gain for January, 2023.  Their 10-City Composite annual increase came in at 2.5% and their 20-City Composite posted a 2,5% year-over-year gain.  While positive, the indices were down from previous months. “2023 began as 2022 had ended, with U.S. home prices falling for the seventh consecutive month….January’s market weakness was broadly based. Before seasonal adjustment, 19 cities registered a decline; the seasonally adjusted picture is a bit brighter, with only 15 cities declining. With or without seasonal adjustment, most cities’ January declines were less severe…

With Springtime in full gear now is a good time to get up to speed with those deadly whirlwinds that few of us ever want to see firsthand, tornadoes.  Today’s infographic from Weather.gov tells us about the various types of tornadoes and how to correctly identify them.  In addition, Home Depot has put together a handy severe weather emergency checklist to not only be prepared but keep track of what you have on-hand and and supplies you might need – for any disaster.  Remember, severe weather can strike at any time and with little to no warning.  And, as always, stay…

The National Association of Home Builders says single-family market share continues to shift away from large metro areas.  Citing data from their recent Q4 Home Building Geography Index (HBGI), they say the largest growth in single-family market share came in rural markets (micro counties and non-metro micro counties), rising from 9.4% in Q4 2019 to a share of 11.8% in Q4 2022.  In addition, they report that multifamily construction market remains elevated above historical levels, with six of the seven submarkets experiencing growth rates above 15% during the final quarter of 2022. “While the largest single-family market continues to be…

According to key trends from Remodeling Magazine’s 37th annual Cost vs. Value Report, exterior improvement projects continued a multiyear trend of providing the greatest return on investment (ROI) for homeowners.  Remodeling says this year’s report confirms a consistent truth that has been revealed on every report for the last 30 years: Exterior replacement projects typically provide a higher return on investment than interior discretionary remodels at the time of house sale.   Indeed… “The reason for high returns on exterior projects stems from what real-estate professionals regularly witness from buyers: If their first impression is a run-down exterior, they tend to…