Real Estate & Mortgage

Affordable Homes

This from BankRate.com. Housing is still affordable in the right spots

The article says that Coastal metropolises like Los Angeles, New York, Boston and San Francisco all might be ranked among the most desirable places to live, but they are expensive! Thus home prices make it tuff to find affordable housing.

The article refeences Lawrence Yun an Econmist from NAR. He says high home prices in popular coastal cities appear to be driving a wave of migration to less costly locales, according to , economist at the National Association of Realtors, or NAR. "Californians are buying up properties in cheaper neighboring states. On the East Coast,  prospective homeowners are seeking out property in Virginia and the Carolinas."

It appears  United Van Lines reported that California had a higher number of outbound moves relative to inbound ones for the first time since 1995. For every 44 moves into the state last year, the company handled 56 outbound moves.States with a much higher number of people moving in rather than out included Oregon, Idaho, Arizona and North Carolina.

Overall, housing affordability nationwide is at its lowest point in 15 years, according to the NAR. In December, the percentage of households in California able to afford a median-priced home stood at 14 percent, according to the California Association of Realtors. New York City, Boston, Washington, D.C., and increasingly, South Florida homes, , according to Yun, are also progressively unaffordable. The most affordable markets, by contrast, tend to be in the Midwest.

Foreclosures Up

RealtyTrac™ an online marketplace for foreclosure properties, released its January 2006 Monthly U.S. Foreclosure Market Report, which shows 103,540 properties nationwide entered some stage of foreclosure in January, a 27% increase from the previous month and a 45 percent increase from January 2005.

The report shows a January national foreclosure rate of 1 foreclosure - repo property for every 1,117 U.S. households, continuing an upward trend in which the national foreclosure rate rose in every quarter of 2005.

"This is the first time since we introduced the report in January of 2005 that we've seen back-to-back months with increases of more than 20 percent," noted James J. Saccacio, chief executive officer of RealtyTrac. "While some of this might have to do with the seasonality of normal real estate cycles, it appears that rising interest rates and softening home prices are beginning to push foreclosure inventories closer to the historic average of one percent of all U.S. households."

Who has the biggest rate of foreclosure? Georgia wins.

Georgia foreclosures spiked in January. The state reported 7,342 properties entering some stage of foreclosure, more than twice the number reported in December. Georgia documented the highest foreclosure rate among the 50 states -- one new foreclosure for every 422 households.

Who was 2nd? The land that has been one of the hottest . With one new foreclosure for every 483 households, Nevada documented the second highest foreclosure rate among the 50 states. The state reported 1,795 properties entering some stage of foreclosure, a 60 percent increase from December and more than 2.5 times the number reported in January 2005.

With a total of 3,747 properties entering some stage of foreclosure, new foreclosures in Colorado tripled from December to January and increased 36 percent year over year. The state recorded one new foreclosure for every 488 households -- the third highest foreclosure rate among the 50 states.

4th Quarter Homes Sales stay blistering

David Lereah, NAR’s chief economist, said rising interest rates dampened the sales pace in the closing quarter of last year. “Mortgage interest rates were at the highest level since the third quarter of 2003,” he said. “At the same time, we’ve seen strong double-digit appreciation in home prices, so a modest slowing from record sales was to be expected. The good news is that home sales are being sustained at historically high levels.”

The latest report on total existing-home sales shows that nationwide the seasonally adjusted annual rate* was 6.90 million units in the fourth quarter, up 0.3 percent from the 6.88 million-unit level in the fourth quarter of 2004 but 4.7 percent below the record pace of 7.24 million units in the third quarter of last year. The second highest sales rate was 7.22 million in the second quarter of 2005.

The strongest performance was in Arkansas, where the fourth-quarter resale pace jumped 29.8 percent compared with the fourth quarter of 2004. Alaska existing-home sales rose 28.4 percent from a year earlier, while Louisiana posted the third highest increase, up 28.1 percent. Six other states also recorded double-digit sales gains from a year ago. Twenty-three states and the Wahington DC Real Estate posted declines, although 39 states set records for all of 2005.

Total existing-home sales, including single-family and condo, were at the third-highest pace on record in the fourth quarter of 2005. In addition, 24 states showed increases in sales activity over the same period in 2004, according to the National Association of Realtors®.

New Home Builders Confident

After  six-months of lower confidence levels reached during the middle of last year, the HMI in January registered 57 for the 2nd month in a row, indicating that builders see positive conditions in their markets. It seems a drop in mortgage interest rates and a rise in consumer confidence have helped this stabilize the confidence and market expectations of single-family home builders.

"Housing markets across the country have cooled, as predicted, and builders are aware that some slowing in demand is inevitable following the record-breaking sales for the past three years," said NAHB President David Pressly. "While the recent decline in mortgage rates has helped buoy builder confidence, they are adjusting to the changes they are seeing and hearing in their sales offices."

Construction Spending Remains Above $1 TRILLION

The annual pace of construction spending topped $1 trillion for the 16th month in Oct 2005, rising 7.9 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $1.13 trillion, according to a recent report by the U.S. Census Bureau. Construction spending totaled $930.9 billion during the first 10 months of the year, up 8.8 percent over construction spending during the same period in 2004. The annual pace of total construction spending has remained above $1 trillion since July 2004.

Spending on residential construction in October 2005 increased 8.3 percent over the previous year to reach a rate of $636.8 billion. The value of nonresidential construction put into place in October rose 7.4 percent to a rate of $494.9 billion, according to the report.

New Construction Booms

The Commerce Department said Monday that total August spending rose by 0.4 percent, the biggest increase in three months. It pushed building activity to an all-time high of $1.11 trillion at a seasonally adjusted annual rate.

New Home Construction is Booming

New Miami real estate

Miami Real Estate: Information, Listings of homes, condos, and land & information about Miami Dade real estate.

Miami Dade County, Florida construction of new single-family homes (not condos)increased by 40% in 2004 vs 2003. New home construction in Broward County increased  275, according to Metrostudy, a market research firm.

Demand for new homes has skyrocketed in the two counties, leaving builders scrambling for available land to develop. Last year, more than 8,600 single-family homes were built in Miami-Dade.

The construction was largely concentrated in the city of Homestead, although builders are finding developable land elsewhere and are building condominiums at an unprecedented level.

Fresno Real Estate Busy

Fresno home values are bringing in the big real estate boy's. Developers like KB Homes, Woodside Homes, Laffert and Mathews Homes are returning to Fresno after a hiatus. The developers are planning on offering more sophisticated choices for the discriminating home buyer. Stockton's Mathews homes will build out 870 new homes near Lake Millerton.

Housing giant KB Home is back after a five-year absence and at least three other developers will debut in the next few months. Woodside Homes, which is preparing three subdivisions in Fresno and Clovis.

It is believed that refugees from the Bay Area and Los Angeles are cashing out their real estate to buy more house in the central San Joaquin Valley, in areas like Fresno, Stockton and Modesto real estate.

Builders say New Homes Still Hot

"Builders are saying they have enough orders to go forward for another six or 12 months," said Gopal Ahluwalia, vice president of research for the National Association of Home Builders.

The January HMI was 70, down a point from December. Numbers over 50 indicate that a majority of builders surveyed regard sales conditions as favorable.

"Interest rates are still low by historical standards, the job market is good, unemployment is declining, consumer confidence is still high and home appreciation is still good," said "It's a combination of these factors that more and more consumers are jumping into the market place to buy a house now."

Baltimore, Maryland new homes for sale