Housing Wire

JULY 10, 2024

With the release of the CoreLogic 2024 Q1 Equity Insights report, which Logan discussed last week , and now the FHFA National Mortgage Database Aggregate Statistics , we have a lot of visibility into the financial position of the American homeowner. The important message in the mortgage data is that even as the economy perhaps finally slows and even as mortgage rates stay higher for longer than anyone expected, the housing market remains buoyed by an incredible cushion of very strong borrowers.

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Inventory Housing Market Mortgage Marketing 533

Appraisal Buzz

JULY 26, 2024

Though home prices have plateaued in many areas, they remain near record highs across the United States. According to the opinions of LendingTree staff writer Jacob Channel, with steep housing costs, some Americans may recall the dramatic price surges of the early to mid-2000s, which preceded the Great Recession of 2007-2009. This historical comparison might incite panic, as the Great Recession led to significant home value declines and numerous foreclosures.

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Housing Wire

JULY 20, 2024

We finally have six weeks of numbers that hit my housing inventory growth model perfectly in 2024. Last year, with higher mortgage rates , we had zero weeks at this level so I am now giving 2024 inventory growth a grade of A. Low inventory has plagued the housing market since the pandemic, plummeting to all-time lows in March of 2022 when we only had 240,000 single-family homes available for sale.

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Housing Wire

JULY 23, 2024

Mortgage rates continue to move lower this week even as higher borrowing costs have kept activity subdued across many areas of the housing market. According to data at HousingWire ’s Mortgage Rates Center , the average rate for 30-year conforming loans was at 7.01% on Tuesday, down 5 basis points from one week ago and 10 basis points lower than two weeks ago.

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Speaker: Timothy Allsopp

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Construction

Housing Wire

JULY 17, 2024

Appraisal 508

Appraisal 508

Housing Wire

JULY 17, 2024

There is no escaping the reality that the recent NAR/Sitzer/Burnett settlements is already changing the real estate world as we know it. Amongst the most substantial terms of that agreement is a blanket ban on the requirement that agents subscribe to MLSs to offer or accept compensation for their work. There has been quite a bit of discussion already about how this will impact the traditional residential purchase.

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Housing Wire

JULY 15, 2024

Is it darkest before the dawn? If we look at the housing market right now, sales are down, new listings are down and prices are decelerating. But if we look at the data right now, things look the most bullish they’ve been all year. Good inflation data came in last week, the bond market rallied and mortgage rates took a notable dip below 7% for the first time in months.

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Housing Market New Listings Marketing Mortgage 486

Housing Wire

JULY 16, 2024

President Joe Biden released a legislative proposal on Tuesday that’s rankling the real estate industry — nationwide rent control. Biden’s new plan would cap annual rent hikes at 5% for two years for landlords who manage 50 or more rental units, which the administration said would cover 20 million units, or roughly half of all rental units in the country.

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Housing Wire

JULY 25, 2024

Mr. Cooper Group has struck a deal to acquire a third-party origination (TPO) platform and $356 billion in mortgage servicing rights (MSRs), advances and subservicing contracts from Flagstar Bank , owned by New York Community Bancorp (NYCB). As part of the deal, the Dallas-based servicer and lender will pay $1.4 billion in cash, funded via available cash and drawdowns of existing MSR lines.

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Business Retail Contracts Mortgage 480

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Real Estate

Housing Wire

JULY 27, 2024

One of my critical forecasts for 2024 was the growth of new listings data and active inventory, even with higher mortgage rates. However, the new listings data has slightly disappointed me. Many of my CNBC interviews , starting from late last year and just last week , have been on this theme, and new listings have grown in 2024. But, I set targets with a minimum 80,000 new listings for at least one week at the seasonal peak and that didn’t happen; the peak so far was 72,329, and now we are enter

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Housing Wire

JULY 1, 2024

HousingWire is excited to announce the winners of the 2024 Women of Influence award, recognizing 100 women who are shaping and propelling the housing economy forward with their impressive achievements. This year marks the 15th year of this award program. Many of this year’s winners mentor women in the industry, paving the way for a new generation of leaders.

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Realty Real Estate Chief Valuation Officer Technology 470

Housing Wire

JULY 8, 2024

Nationally, the housing market indicators have been slow for several months now. There have been a few markets; however, that have defied the national trends where inventory has stayed tighter and demand keeps rolling in. Available inventory of unsold homes in the U.S. is 40% more now than last year, but some markets are just now starting to lift beyond the pandemic lows.

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Inventory Contracts Sellers New Listings 468

Housing Wire

JULY 11, 2024

Mortgage rates are falling today as the CPI inflation data came in lighter than anticipated. The shelter side of the equation was a big help in today’s report. The financial markets’ dynamism was evident in the immediate reaction to the 10-year yield, which had a waterfall dive to a key critical level of around 4.20%, as shown below. With the labor market showing signs of softening and the Federal Reserve expressing concerns, the possibility of our first-rate cut in 2024 looms.

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Mortgage Marketing Housing Market 467

Housing Wire

JULY 15, 2024

President Joe Biden will propose on Tuesday a nationwide cap on rent hikes of 5% per year, according to The Washington Post, which cites “three people familiar with the matter.” The proposal will rescind unspecified tax breaks to landlords who raise rents by more than 5%, although it would only apply to landlords who own more than 50 rental units. This would cover roughly half of all rental units in the country, according to Post sources.

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Landlords Property Taxes Construction Mortgage 465

Housing Wire

JULY 24, 2024

While there is no doubt that the Florida housing market has slowed since the height of the post-pandemic homebuying boom, the state’s condominium market has been especially hard hit, according to local agents. “It has definitely slowed,” said Cyndee Haydon , a Seminole-based agent for Future Home Realty. “Inventory has gone from a three-month supply a year ago to at least six months, so really we are into a buyers’ market now.

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Housing Wire

JULY 6, 2024

Now that we are halfway through the year, we can see that active inventory in America is growing, unlike what happened in 2023. This is precisely what the doctor ordered for the housing market. In March of 2022, we only had 240,000 active single-family homes available for sale, leading me to call the housing market savagely unhealthy as we simply had too many people chasing too few homes.

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Housing Market Mortgage Inventory Marketing 465

Housing Wire

JULY 23, 2024

Sinking sales, rapidly rising inventory and prices at all-time highs — this is the state of the market for existing homes. That’s according to June’s existing-home sales data from the National Association of Realtors (NAR), which reflect the problems that have hampered housing markets since mortgage rates began to rise in 2022. Sales of existing homes in June fell 5.4% year over year and month over month to a seasonally adjusted rate of 3.89 million.

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Inventory Buyers Sellers Inspection 461

Housing Wire

JULY 23, 2024

Today’s existing home sales report shows that the existing home market is now almost balanced. That might sound strange, but like most things I do, I have a model for it. We are very close to getting this balance nationally and in some markets we’re already there. I have often discussed four months of supply and active inventory between 1.52 and 1.93 million as a balanced market, but this equation has a second variable tied to today’s housing economics: affordability.

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Housing Wire

JULY 26, 2024

Secure payment provider Payload is launching a new payment and billing tool specifically geared to buyer agents , according to an announcement on Thursday. In a release, Payload said it created the solution in response to the terms of the National Association of Realtors’ nationwide commission lawsu it settlement agreement , and the potential changes to buyer agent compensation.

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Tools Buyers Agents Contracts 457

Housing Wire

JULY 30, 2024

Mr. Cooper Group has priced the issuance of $750 million in debt to refinance outstanding mortgage servicing rights (MSR) facilities, an announcement that comes only four days after making public its billion-dollar acquisition of Flagstar Bank ‘s servicing assets. On Monday, the mortgage lender and servicer said that its debt offering to qualified investors through subsidiary Nationstar Mortgage Holdings will bear an annual interest rate of 6.5% that is payable semiannually.

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Investors Contracts Mortgage Marketing 452

Housing Wire

JULY 12, 2024

A survey of mortgage default servicing leaders revealed that foreclosures are expected to rise slowly during the second half of 2024, while ample amounts of home equity should keep many properties in loss mitigation from moving into foreclosure status. Auction.com , a marketplace for distressed home sales, released its 2024 Seller Insights report on Friday.

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Property Taxes Mortgage Insurance Government 455

Housing Wire

JULY 1, 2024

In the game of housing crisis Rochambeau, we play with income, inventory, and policy. Inventory cannot beat inadequate incomes, but better compensation policies can. The labor market has reached peak disengagement rates, partially driven by historic strikes , resignations , non-participation , and silent quitting. By splitting the workforce into five income groups to view homeownership rates, we lay bare a cause for retreat from an increasingly unfair labor market – a system with four times more

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Real Estate Government Inventory Housing Market 455

Housing Wire

JULY 5, 2024

With today’s jobs report and all the reports we got during this jobs week, can we finally say the Federal Reserve is winning its war against the labor market? I believe the Fed won’t pivot until the labor market breaks. That has been my position since 2022 and we are starting to see some early signs of them successfully attacking the U.S. labor market in the past few months, something I talked about on a recent HousingWire Daily podcast.

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Marketing Housing Market Government Construction 453

Housing Wire

JULY 30, 2024

Rate has hired a new head coach. The Chicago -based mortgage lender announced Tuesday that it’s bringing on Daniel Manginelli to lead its sales coaching program, which is designed to help mortgage professionals implement best practices and improve performance. According to the company, the coaching program for salespeople makes Rate one of only 10 mortgage companies with in-house coaching. “We hold back nothing in providing our professionals with world-class training and ensuring that our

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Tools Training Design Finance 448

Housing Wire

JULY 31, 2024

Although Americans have complained about high housing costs for decades, their concerns have taken on a fevered pitch recently. At first glance, these concerns seem reasonable: home prices have increased by more than 50% since the end of 2019. This is an annual growth rate of almost 14%—far higher than the long run average rate of 4%. We’ve recently lived through an unusually rapid run-up in home prices.

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Finance Construction Mortgage Investing 448

Housing Wire

JULY 25, 2024

If closed as expected, the acquisition of Flagstar Bank ‘s servicing businesses has the potential to make the mortgage servicing rights (MSR) portfolios of Mr. Cooper Group reach the $1.56 trillion mark in unpaid principal balance (UPB), consolidating the company into the top mortgage servicer in the country. Mr. Cooper executives are deploying the strategy of increasing their servicing book to take advantage of an extensive customer base that is likely to refinance their mortgages when i

Business 447

Business Mortgage Finance Marketing 447

Housing Wire

JULY 19, 2024

They say everything is bigger in Texas — and apparently that includes housing inventory growth. While available homes for sale are growing all over the country , it’s happening at a dramatic scale in Texas. According to a second-quarter 2024 report from Texas Realtors, the number of active listings from April to June of this year were up 40.8% compared to the same period last year.

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Inventory Realtors Housing Market Buyers 448

Housing Wire

JULY 29, 2024

The rising supply of homes for sale has yet to put a serious dent in affordability concerns, but it might be starting to. That’s according to First American ’s monthly Real House Price Index, which shows a national price decline of 1.3% from May to June. The index measures nominal home prices and adjusts them to account for changes in household income and interest rates.

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Inventory Marketing Buyers Housing Market 446

Housing Wire

JULY 24, 2024

Will the Federal Reserve pivot in time to save construction workers? We have discussed this topic for some time now because, for the first time in a while, single-family permits are falling and 5-unit permits are already in recession. This is key because, traditionally, residential construction workers are the first to lose their jobs before every recession since higher mortgage rates hit housing first.

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Construction Inventory Mortgage Marketing 446

Appraisal Buzz

JULY 10, 2024

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) has proposed new rules to simplify the process for homeowners to get help when struggling to pay their mortgage. “ Streamlining Mortgage Servicing for Borrowers Experiencing Payment Difficulties ,” if finalized, would require mortgage servicers to focus on helping borrowers, not foreclosing, when a homeowner asks for help.

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Mortgage Home Improvement Government Investors 448

Housing Wire

JULY 31, 2024

After plummeting to an all-time low in May , pending home sales bounced back a bit in June, with the Pending Home Sales Index rising 4.8%, according to data released Wednesday by the National Association of Realtors (NAR). The index rose from a reading of 70.8 in May to 74.3 in June, although the latter reading was down 2.6% on an annual basis. A reading of 100 is equal to the level of contract activity in 2001.

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Housing Market Contracts Inventory Realtors 443

Housing Wire

JULY 26, 2024

Richard Blumenthal, the senior U.S. senator from Connecticut , sent a letter last week to Acting U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Adrianne Todman asking why what he describes as a “backlog” of housing discrimination complaints has yet to be addressed. The letter, first reported by local Connecticut outlet CT Insider , describes the lag in investigations related to such complaints that impact prospective homeowners and renters both within the state and nationwide,

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