Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 11, 2021
You could buy a top-of-the-line laptop and a new cell phone to match, or you could pay one month’s rent for a single-family home in Los Angeles. It’s not much better for prospective single-family renters across California, a study by HouseCanary found. In Ventura or Carlsbad, median single-family rents are $4,250, and in Santa Clara and Berkeley, median single-family rents reached $4,225 and $4,200, respectively.
Sacramento Appraisal Blog
NOVEMBER 8, 2021
Last week Zillow announced failure as a home flipper and there were no candle vigils. But there has been so much talk and I’ve heard everything from “This means the market is going to crash” to “The iBuyer model is dead.” Let’s talk about what this failure really means. Any thoughts? Skim topics of interest […].
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Appraisal Buzz
NOVEMBER 15, 2021
Matt Simmons has been busy with his sixth edition of “Random Thoughts of an Appraiser!” There are plenty of times where appraisers have collectively had thoughts or concepts that can be communicated and/or questioned in a sentence and don’t need a dedicated article. We are pleased to have Matt Simmons, partner of Maxwell, Hendry & Simmons, offer a periodic collection of observations on what’s going on in the valuation world.
Miller Samuel
NOVEMBER 7, 2021
Yes, big data usually infers 'quantitative' analysis, as in "relying on numbers." The Zestimate legacy of profound inaccuracy finally reached a devastating conclusion with the collapse of Zillow Offers this week and the loss of hundreds of millions in shareholder equity. Zillow never figured out the qualitative part that enables the actual precision in the pricing of a home sale.
Cleveland Appraisal Blog
NOVEMBER 11, 2021
I have written several articles demonstrating the inaccuracy of AVMs like Zillow’s Zestimates. You might enjoy reading “ AVM’s & Punxsutawney Phil’s Accuracy “, “ AVM’s… The Wonder Bread of Value “, “ Appraiser vs. AVM vs. Zestimate…Ten Properties ” and finally, “ iBuyers…The Pawn Shops of Real Estate “ Obviously, this topic is of interest to me, seeing is that value is my profession.
George Dell
NOVEMBER 24, 2021
Zillow Zestimate has been the go-to source for consumers to check what their house is worth for many years now. Zillow leverages the traffic that this brings to their web site to sell other real estate services (not valuation products!). The Zestimate has been amazing at driving traffic to the Zillow web site, but does […]. The post What Happened to Zillow?
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Sacramento Appraisal Blog
NOVEMBER 1, 2021
Are buyers struggling to afford the market? Let’s talk about that today. I have some brand new visuals to share (Part I) and then let’s unpack a new study about affording new construction (Part II). What are you seeing in your area regarding affordability? I’d love to hear. PART ONE: Affordability 1) Duh, affordability is […].
Appraisal Buzz
NOVEMBER 10, 2021
In today’s Buzzcast, we dive into the racial and ethnic gaps within the home purchase appraisal. Today we have Jim Morrison, VP of Marketing and Sales for Allterra Group, Scott Reuter, Chief Appraiser and Director of Valuation of Freddie Mac, and Vivian Li, Senior Manager of Quantitative Analytics of Freddie Mac. We’ll be getting the inside scoop while they discuss the studies and data surrounding this hot button issue.
Miller Samuel
NOVEMBER 7, 2021
The news came quickly and brutally (especially if you were a ZG investor): @mortgage_yack #zillow #PINKHolidayRemix #realestate #utahrealestate ? original sound - Jack. I jumped on the bandwagon with this: This just in: The “A” in “Zillow” stands for “Accuracy.” [link] — Jonathan Miller (@jonathanmiller) November 3, 2021. And this was a perfect post: so zillow let a robot buy up thousands of properties, outbidding real buyers and artificially inflating the market, and now will be laying of
The Appraiser Coach
NOVEMBER 2, 2021
As an appraiser, you’re a real estate professional and you are in the business of valuing property. Inevitably, at some point in your career, you’re going to make another real. Read More.
George Dell
NOVEMBER 3, 2021
Modernization means bring in modern methods. What are they? Why aren’t they here? Is it really that hard? We have big financial resources. We have motive. We have huge organizations in place. And we have regulatory clout! Appraisal is just one type of valuation, done by super-regulated, licensed appraisers. Competing valuation products, like AVMs (Automated […].
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 22, 2021
The National Association of Realtors ‘ existing home sales report for October came in at a solid beat of estimates at 6.34 million. This number is above my trend sales peak of 6.2 million and that means we have had back-to-back existing home sales prints of over 6.2 million. Early in the year, I had discussed that if existing home sales stay in a range between 5.84 million and 6.2 million, that would mean it’s a good year for housing demand.
Sacramento Appraisal Blog
NOVEMBER 17, 2021
Real estate has been slowing, but it’s still completely nuts. I’ll explain below. But first let me unpack the NAR conference in San Diego and share some exciting personal news. Then stats and perspective for those interested. NAR Conference & my new BFF: I had the honor of sitting on an appraiser panel last weekend […].
Appraisal Buzz
NOVEMBER 24, 2021
In today’s Buzzcast, we dive into the hot button issue of how appraisers are handling this market. Today we have George Dell, Owner of Valuemetrics, with Joan Trice, Founder of Allterra Group, LLC. We’ll be getting the inside scoop while they discuss what’s being done. How has this new market been different than what is considered “normal?” In what ways are appraisers reacting?
Eyes on Housing
NOVEMBER 24, 2021
Contracts for new, single-family home sales were flat at a 745,000 seasonally adjusted annual rate in October according to estimates from the joint release of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the U.S. Census Bureau. However, the flat reading was due to a significant downward revision for the September pace (revised from an 800,00 rate to.
The Appraiser Coach
NOVEMBER 30, 2021
Realtor magazine published an article about whether or not listing photos should stay online after the home has sold. Some homeowners have privacy and safety concerns over these photos being. Read More.
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 17, 2021
Today, the U.S. Census Bureau reported that housing starts came in as a miss of estimates at 1.52 million for October and housing permits came in at a beat at 1.65 million. Revisions came in negative, but the real story here is that housing is back to its slow construction phase, which isn’t shocking considering where monthly supply is at and the delays in construction that we are all aware of.
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 26, 2021
Life comes at you fast. During this Thanksgiving week, we went from higher yields and the first Fed rate hike storyline to a big drop in bond yields and scary headlines on a new COVID variant, Omicron. How do we make sense of all this? In this type of economic environment is it even possible for mortgage rates to get to 4% and can the Federal Reserve really hike rates in an aggressive fashion?
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 5, 2021
J.P. Morgan , through its private label conduit , J.P. Morgan Mortgage Trust , so far this year has sponsored 13 private-label securitization offerings backed by jumbo loans valued at $13.8 billion. Those offerings, current through the end of October, involved more than 14,000 jumbo mortgages, according to bond-rating agency presale reports. The data show that J.P.
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 30, 2021
The Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) today announced the baseline conforming loan limit for 2022 will be $647,200, an increase of 18%. The federal government will now back mortgage loans of nearly $1 million, with the new ceiling loan limit for one-unit properties in most high-cost areas now $970,800 — or 150% of $647,200. Special statutory provisions establish different loan limit calculations for Alaska, Hawaii, Guam, and the U.S.
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 29, 2021
Today, pending home sales came in as a big beat of estimates — up 7.5% in October — and since we are days away from December, we can officially label the 2021 housing crash bears as even worse than the 2020 housing crash bears. Like I have often said, professional grifters have plagued the housing sector for many years and shouldn’t be looked to as fundamental economic sources of information.
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 9, 2021
One of the most unloved American economic success stories has been how spectacular American households with mortgage debt look today. Let’s take a look at the New York Federal Reserve’s Household Debt and Credit Report for the third quarter, released today. The most important factor is that debt structures are vanilla. Post-2010, lending standards in America became normal again, and while I still believe they’re very liberal, they’re sane.
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 4, 2021
For career switchers looking for a new path that doesn’t necessarily require a college degree, they could do worse than the building trades. To keep pace with current construction demand, and account for attrition, 740,000 new construction workers are needed each year for the next three years , a report by the Home Builders Institute contends. “The construction industry needs more than 61,000 new hires every month, if we are to keep up with both industry growth and the loss of workers either thr
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 8, 2021
Economic cycles are like serial killers on a Netflix show: they leave clues to get caught. Interpreting these clues gives you the ability to see when the economy is in recovery and when things are about to go into recession. My job as a data analyst is to provide the map you need to follow these clues, specifically as they relate to housing. Each economic sector behaves differently in a recession; typically, the industry with the most leverage on growth gets hit the hardest.
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 15, 2021
Vishal Garg, founder and CEO, Better.com. Better.com is struggling to deal with the waning influence of refis in the mortgage market, with preliminary results published by their SPAC partner revealing that the digital lender expects a net loss between $85 million and $100 million in the third quarter. And the forecast looks even worse for the fourth quarter, documents show.
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 2, 2021
On Tuesday Zillow announced it will be shutting down its Offers business, which wasn’t too much of a shock considering how their stock had been performing for some time. The news was that they had been overpaying for homes and their losses on those purchases were getting larger and larger. Life being a publicly traded company can be fantastic or brutal at times.
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 18, 2021
Mortgage rates strongly increased above 3% in the week ending November 18, according to the latest Freddie Mac PMMS mortgage report. The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage hit 3.10%, up 12 basis points from 2.98% the week prior. A year ago at this time, the average 30-year fixed-rate loan averaged just 2.72%. Sam Khater, Freddie Mac’s chief economist, said the combination of rising inflation and consumer spending is driving mortgage rates higher.
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 9, 2021
Mortgage delinquency rates hit the lowest level since the beginning of the pandemic in August, according to the most recent CoreLogic Loan Performance Report. However, some borrowers are still facing severe financial challenges. In August, 4% of mortgages were delinquent by at least 30 days, including foreclosure, a drop from the 6.6% rate in August of 2020.
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 8, 2021
Forbearance predictably declined across the board last week as exits accelerated, but more borrowers are going into plan modifications because they are still struggling to recover their pre-pandemic income. The total number of loans in forbearance decreased by nine basis points to 2.06% as of Oct. 31, according to the latest report from the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA).
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 24, 2021
Today the Census Bureau new home sales report came in as a miss of estimates at 745,000. In addition, revisions were all negative and the monthly supply of new homes rose. In contrast to the existing home sales market, which I would say is outperforming currently with the recent growth in sales, the new home sales market is just OK and has been for some time.
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 15, 2021
Real estate investors spent a record $63.6 billion to purchase homes in the third quarter, up 78% from a year earlier, with an intense housing shortage fueling their returns, according to a Redfin report published on Monday. In total, investors acquired 90,215 homes in the third quarter, an 80.2% increase year-over-year. Redfin defines an investor as any institution or business that purchases residential real estate.
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 16, 2021
Mortgage applications for new home purchases dipped by 15.2% year-to-year in October, according to a monthly builder survey published by the Mortgage Bankers Association this week. However, on a month-to-month basis, activity was actually 6% higher in October than in the month prior. The strong monthly gain puts MBA’s estimate of new home sales at its strongest pace since January 2021, the report said.
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 10, 2021
Mortgage rates fell below 3% in the week ending November 10, according to the latest Freddie Mac PMMS mortgage report. The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage declined to 2.98% last week, falling 11 basis points from 3.09% the week prior. A year ago at this time, the average 30-year fixed-rate loan averaged 2.84%. “Despite the re-acceleration of economic growth, the recent bond rally drove mortgage rates down for the second consecutive week,” Sam Khater, Freddie Mac’s chief economist, said in a statemen
Housing Wire
NOVEMBER 29, 2021
The supply-chain bottleneck afflicting the global economy has its own counterpart in the world of residential mortgage-backed securities, also referred to as RMBS. One group of industry players — loan underwriters — are the chief cause of the logjam. They are in high demand for each stage of the mortgage process, yet they are in seriously short supply in a still-booming mortgage market.
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