Home buyers are willing to make extreme sacrifices and even give up some basic rights to get a chance at homeownership or help with their down payment, a new survey shows. In exchange for a 10 percent down payment, would-be buyers said they’d forgo their dream car, vacations, and even their right to vote.Twenty-two percent of 1,000 buyers recently surveyed said they’d be willing to give up the right to vote in exchange for a 10 percent down
Blame it on the low inventory of available property: Total existing-home sales failed to gain traction in April, according to the National Association of REALTORS® latest housing report, released Thursday.Total existing-home sales—which are completed transactions that include single-family homes, townhomes, condos, and co-ops—decreased 2.5 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.46 million in April. Sales are now 1.4 percent below
A rise in interest rates last week may have prompted would-be refinancers and home buyers to pause. Mortgage applications—for both refinancings and home purchases—dropped 2.6 percent last week on a seasonally adjusted basis, the Mortgage Bankers Association reported Wednesday. Mortgage volume is now 10.5 percent lower than a year ago.The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage rose to its highest level since April 2011 last week—a 4.86 percent average,
House flipping activity surged to an 11-year high this year, with more than 207,000 homes flipped, according to ATTOM Data Solutions, a real estate data firm. But the key is knowing where to be and when. “The sweet spot for successful home flipping is finding the neighborhoods just emerging as the next hot neighborhoods in a city,” says Daren Blomquist, a senior vice president at ATTOM Data Solutions. The firm says the average profit for a
HomeServices of America Inc., the company owned by billionaire Warren Buffet, has acquired the Ebby Halliday brand. The acquisition includes Ebby Halliday, REALTORS®; Dave Perry-Miller Real Estate; and William Trew Real Estate. The brand boasts more than 1,700 agents in over 30 offices. Its affiliates, Home Team Mortgage and Texas Premier Title, are also included in the deal.Ebby HallidayDespite the acquisition, the Ebby Halliday brand will rema
The U.S. House passed a bipartisan bill on Tuesday that will roll back some of the strict rules placed on thousands of small- and medium-sized banks enacted as part of the 2010 Dodd-Frank law.“We commend members of Congress for passing this bipartisan legislation to level the lending playing field for community banks and credit unions,” says NAR President Elizabeth Mendenhall. “This bill provides appropriate consumer protections while goin
More homes are being sold for at or above the list price, according to the latest REALTORS® Confidence Index Survey, a survey of real estate pros on their most recent transactions. Thirty-seven percent of properties that closed in February sold at or above the list price, according to the survey. A year ago, 35 percent of properties sold at or above the list price. From January 2012 through 2015, about a quarter of homes would sell for at or ab
Americans are migrating from high-priced, less affordable markets in favor of more reasonably priced areas, according to a new analysis by ATTOM Data Solutions, a real estate data firm. Population trends show residents are leaving less affordable markets—like Los Angeles County, Calif., and Kings County, N.Y.,—and are instead choosing places with median prices in the $250,000 to $300,000 range.Three of the four top markets with the largest po
While coastal cities have long been hotbeds for industry development and relocating homeowners, metros in Texas are beginning to usurp them as top places for prosperity. The Lone Star state boasted six of the top 20 prosperous cities, according to apartment site RentCafé.What makes a city prosperous? RentCafé researchers analyzed six indicators of prosperity throughout U.S. cities with populations of more than 100,000 to see how they’ve chang
Since mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac announced last year special rules for when a property does not need a traditional in-person appraisal, only about 5 percent of Fannie’s 1.2 million home mortgages—or 60,000—have qualified, The Washington Post reports. Freddie estimates that, eventually, no-appraisal mortgages will account for up to 15 percent of its new loans.In some transactions, Fannie and Freddie are relying on proprieta
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