Housing Market

Here are the three metros where homeownership is still affordable

The rapid rise in home prices and housing costs over the past five years has strained affordability in every part of the country, but a new study seeks to put a finer point on which metropolitan areas are getting hit the hardest. Realtor.com calculated the share of income a typical household spends on housing by […]

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New Home Co. acquires Landsea, forming a top 25 homebuilder

New Home Co. has completed a previously announced acquisition of Landsea Homes, the companies announced Wednesday. The deal creates a top-25 national homebuilder based on the number of new homes sold in 2024. Matthew Zaist, who currently serves as president and CEO of New Home, will led the combined company. New Home was the nation’s

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US housing construction is dead with current mortgage rates

New home sales missed sales estimates significantly in Wednesday’s report and we have negative revisions to the previous months. The builders’ profit margins are dwindling, which means housing construction, which has been at early COVID-19 recession levels for some time, could worsen if mortgage rates stay elevated or head even higher. So, instead of focusing

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Homebuyers finally catch a break with more inventory

Homebuyers in 2025 are finally getting some good news. Active housing inventory is returning to the levels we experienced before the pandemic, which means the chaotic and unhealthy housing market of the last several years is finally a thing of the past. As someone who was concerned about home prices skyrocketing out of control between

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Home prices are still climbing, but the pace is slowing

Home prices continue to outpace last year, but at a pace that’s slowing down. The S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller Home Price Index for April rose 2.7% year over year, a deceleration from 3.37% in March, 3.9% in February and 4.1% in January. It’s the first data for the Case-Shiller that includes the period after President Donald

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Four charts that perfectly illustrate the housing affordability crisis

Look at all the variables at play in the housing market and it’s hard not to feel pessimistic about the affordability crisis. Mortgage payments continue to increase thanks to high mortgage rates, home insurance premiums are on the rise in markets vulnerable to natural disasters and the rent is still too dang high for renters

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The mortgage market hopes for rate cuts amid war moves

Global tensions between the United States and Iran have led many in the mortgage industry to wonder whether the bombing of Iran nuclear sites would move bond yields and lead to a drop in mortgage rates. On Monday, just as economists were factoring in the possibility of war with Iran, at least one member of

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Inventory is rising, but existing home sales remain in a major slump

The May existing-home sales report from the National Association of Realtors (NAR) shows sales at just 4.03 million, a 0.7% decrease year over year and up 0.8% compared to April. It was the slowest May for existing home sales since 2009 and the fourth consecutive month with a year-over-year decline in sales. Unsold inventory also continues

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Fed Vice Chair Michelle Bowman supports July interest rate cut

After the weekend’s global events, many expected that the bombing of Iran’s nuclear facilities would influence bond yields, either up or down, today. However, the real surprise came from Michelle Bowman, Federal Reserve Vice Chair of Supervision, who talked about a potential rate cut in July. In a speech she gave at a research conference

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How will mortgage rates react to US bombing of Iran?

On Saturday night, the U.S. bombed Iranian nuclear sites, sending shockwaves around the world and leading people to ask me what this means for mortgage rates. This type of global event can lead to significant market movements in oil prices, the U.S. dollar and the 10-year yield in the short term. However, this year, we’ve

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