home prices posts
FeedPosted Jan 27th 2010 8:00AM by Tom Johansmeyer (RSS feed)
Filed under: Indices, Housing, Recession

Home prices fell yet again in November, losing 0.2% month-over-month (on a not seasonally adjusted basis), following a 0.1% drop in October.
The Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller's home price index reported only five out of 20 metro areas with gains, and from November 2008 to November 2009, home prices are off 5.3%. Need a benchmark? It's late 2003: Six years of appreciation have been obliterated by the financial crisis.
The slide worries analysts who wonder if the housing recovery is strong enough to keep moving forward. A stall on the housing side, of course, could push through the rest of the economy, ultimately putting the squeeze on consumer spending (further) and impeding overall growth.
Continue reading Housing Market Slides, but Some Silver Lining Visible
Posted Jan 14th 2010 9:00AM by Tom Johansmeyer (RSS feed)
Filed under: Indices, Economic Data, Housing, Recession

Foreclosure filings spiked in December. The 14% increase from the previous month made the first monthly increase since July -- and a hell of a severe way to break the streak. The double-digit increase,
reported by RealtyTrac, brought the number of
foreclosures to 349,519 in December. In addition to the increase from November, the result is a year-over-year increase of 15% from December 2008. In 2009, 2.8 million foreclosures were filed, up 21% from 2008 and 120% from 2007.
Foreclosure activity reached a monthly high of 361,000 in July, but loan modifications, state legislation extending the foreclosure process and the volume of homes in the foreclosure pipeline had resulted in a gradual decline from that point. From the third quarter to the fourth, foreclosures fell 7%, though the rate was still up 18% from the fourth quarter of 2008. California posted a 17% decline in foreclosures quarter-over-quarter, though it increased 9% from November to December.
Continue reading Foreclosures Rise 14% in December
Posted Nov 20th 2009 2:30PM by Tom Johansmeyer (RSS feed)
Filed under: Economic Data, Housing, Recession
The loans that got us into this mess were generally the first to fall. Variable rate mortgages written without documentation for people with sketchy credit histories shocked nobody as their slide became an avalanche. But, the good stuff is starting to follow. An increasing amount of fixed rate mortgages offered to borrowers with solid credit histories are feeling their ways to foreclosure. Blame unemployment for this one. When people can't work, it gets pretty hard to pay the mortgage.
Fixed rate, high quality mortgages had a foreclosure a year ago. Last quarter, it jumped to 33%, according to a Mortgage Bankers Association report. As this happened, the amount of homeowners behind on their payments or in foreclosure just set another record high ... for the ninth month in a row. Subprime mortgages are headed in the other direction. Low quality adjustable rate mortgages are now 16% of new foreclosures -- compared to 35% last year. And, more than 18% of Federal Housing Administration loans are anywhere from one payment behind to in foreclosure, with California, Nevada, Arizona and Florida worst off: together, they accounted for 44% of new foreclosures.
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
Continue reading Even the good die young? High-quality mortgages approaching foreclosure
Posted Nov 14th 2009 5:30PM by Tom Johansmeyer (RSS feed)
Filed under: Economic Data, Housing
If you're worried about the value of your home, 2010 could bring a little bit of good news. The National Association of Realtors reported Friday that home prices could edge 4% higher next year. In 2009, home prices declined by 13%. The association's chief economist, Lawrence Yun, says, "Going into 2010, I anticipate that prices will also begin stabilizing or begin to modestly improve." He continues, "I don't think the fear factor will be at play in 2010."
First-time buyers taking advantage of a range of incentives -- including an $8,000 tax credit -- accounted for 47% of transactions this year, up from 41% in 2008. With the credit extended to April 30, 2010, there's hope that first-timers will continue to breathe some life into the real estate market. According to Yun, approximately 2 million people gobbled up the tax advantage.
Continue reading Home values could creep up next year
Posted Nov 10th 2009 2:20PM by Connie Madon (RSS feed)
Filed under: Consumer Experience, Economic Data, Personal Finance, Housing, Recession

The housing market is still mired in price declines during the third quarter. Prices declined in 80% of metro areas.
Of the 153 metro areas surveyed, 123 still saw price declines, while 30 saw price increases. Overall, the national median price has fallen 11.2% from last year.
Let's look at specific towns and cities with the highest price declines and the highest price increases:
- Fort Myers, Florida tops the list with a 40% decline. Median home prices were $98,000.00
- Las Vegas, Nevada saw a 35% decline. Median home prices were $138,500.00
- On the up side, Cumberland Maryland saw a price increase of 19% Median home prices rose to $122,100.00
- Davenport, Iowa was next with a 14% increase. Median home prices were $115,600.00.
Continue reading Nationwide home prices fall in 123 of 153 metro areas
Posted Aug 23rd 2009 11:10AM by Tom Johansmeyer (RSS feed)
Filed under: Housing, Recession
It looks like the housing market is coming back, but there's still reason to be careful. In July, home resales had their highest monthly increase in at least a decade. The rush is driven in part by a tax credit that expires on November 30, 2009. The rate of sale grew 7.2%, ahead of expectations.
Last month, sales hit a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.24 million in July -- up from a 4.89 million in June. This is the fourth month in a row in which seasonally adjusted sales increased, and it was the strongest growth rate since August 2007. A Thomson Reuters survey had forecast 5 million, but the reality exceeded that.
Continue reading Housing sales come back, led by first-timers
Posted Aug 17th 2009 4:30PM by Michael Fowlkes (RSS feed)
Filed under: Forecasts, Good news, Market Matters, Money and Finance Today, Housing, Recession, Financial Crisis
Homebuilder confidence hit a 1 year high today, providing another sign that the worst of the housing melt down may have passed.
The housing market started to crumble back in 2006, and since that time foreclosures and falling home prices have hit the economy hard, and played a major role in the recession that has effected millions. Today the The National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo confidence index climbed to 18, the highest level that it has been since June 2008.
Continue reading Homebuilder confidence hits 12 month high
Posted Jul 22nd 2009 3:10PM by Connie Madon (RSS feed)
Filed under: Economic Data, Personal Finance, Housing, Recession

There is a speck of good news in the housing market. According to the Federal Housing Finance Agency, U.S. home prices actually
rose 0.9% from April to May, but overall were down 5.6% from a year earlier.
This was the news against the backdrop of a continuing deterioration in the overall market. Let's look at the big picture for a moment:
- U.S. delinquency rate rose to a seasonally adjusted 9.12% and the foreclosure rate rose to 1.37% the highest since records were kept in 1972.
- One in every eight Americans is now late on their home loan payment or already in foreclosure, according to Jay Brinkmann of the Washington-based bankers' group.
- Notices of default, auction or bank seizure rose to a record in the first half of 2009.
- Realty Trac Inc. reports that one in every 84 U.S. households received a foreclosure filing in July. That was a 15% increase from a year earlier.
Continue reading Home prices: A speck of good news against the backdrop of high unemployment
Posted Jul 20th 2009 4:45PM by Joseph Lazzaro (RSS feed)
Filed under: International Markets, India, China, Brazil, Russia, Recession

At times, during this protracted global recession, it seems as if the entire world depended on home equity loan-fueled U.S. consumption to maintain GDP growth.
De-coupling -- the notion that the emerging market economies of China, India, Brazil and Russia were independent of the developed world, from a GDP growth standpoint, and were self-sustaining -- has been quickly dispelled. "De-coupling" has about as much validity as another ruse that made the rounds in the last boom (as it does in all expansions): the fallacy of
"this time it's different" – the notion that some economic phenomenon can continue indefinitely. During the last expansion there was a widely-held view that housing prices, despite numerous metrics that showed that housing prices had hit bubble levels, could rise at double-digit rates annually, for a decade or more.
Continue reading Engine of growth-wise, it's a whole new ballgame for the global economy
Next Page >