The number of homeowners with an intent to sell that think now is a good time to sell, increased almost 50 percent in the Redfin survey that was just released today from the prior survey three months ago. Today, 22 percent of the homeowners surveyed said now was a good time to sell, up from 15 percent in the prior quarter. Eighty-one percent (81%) of those surveyed feel home prices will rise in the coming year and that is up from 75 percent in the prior quarter. Continue Reading →
One of the most important accomplishments of Dr King and the Civil Rights movement was the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 which was signed into law on July 2, 1964 and prohibited discrimination in public places, provided for integration of schools and made employment discrimination illegal. It did not, however, make discrimination in housing illegal which Dr. King and the Civil Rights Movement continued to work toward. Continue Reading →
Rising home prices helped 100,000 homeowners in the U.S. crawl out of a negative equity position during the 3rd quarter of 2012, according to a report just released by CoreLogic®. During the first nine months of 2012, there were a total of 1.4 million homeowners that found themselves moving from a negative equity position on their homes to a positive equity position. In spite of this vast improvement, twenty two percent of homeowners in the U.S. with a mortgage owe more on their homes than they are currently worth. Continue Reading →
The St. Louis Real Estate Market is still dealing with the effects of foreclosures and other distressed sales but continues to show some improvement, and even what I would describe as a sustained recovery in some neighborhoods though certainly not all. To get the latest St. Louis Real Estate Stats and the latest, best and most comprehensive St Louis Real Estate Data, check out our 5-minute video update below for January for the St Louis real estate market. The update includes charts with up to the date data on the St Louis housing market including St Louis home prices, average time to sell a home in the St Louis area as well as other data and charts to show where the St Louis real estate market is and where it is headed. (Check out all our market update videos on our YouTube Channel – click here. Continue Reading →
During 2012, 18,242 St Louis homeowners received a foreclosure notice, or were in some stage of the foreclosure process, according to a report just released by RealtyTrac. This means 2012 came to an end with 12.02 percent more foreclosures than the year before however there were over 16 percent fewer St. Louis foreclosures than in 2010 when foreclosure activity peaked. Continue Reading →
A report released today by Radarlogic suggests that the housing market is not really recovering as much as it may appear, particularly with regard to home prices. The report says that, the 9.2 percent increase they saw in their home price index for the 12 month period ended November 30, 2012 was the result of a “significant shift in the composition of home sales and overstates the appreciation in individual properties.” The report goes on to say if motivated sales (REO’s, foreclosures, short-sales) are removed from the data, then the “real” increase in home prices was just over half of what their index showed. Continue Reading →
The foreclosure inventory in the U.S. dropped to 3.51 percent in November, a decline of 2.84 percent from the month before, according to the November Mortgage Monitor report released by Lender Processing Services. This trend may not continue though as, during the same period, the mortgage delinquency rate (the precursor to foreclosures) increased 1.2 percent from the month before and has increased 3.7 percent since August. Continue Reading →
On a national real estate site I write for I did an article earlier today about a report that came out indicating the inventory of homes for sale in 35 major metro markets had dropped by 27 percent in the past year while the price per foot of those homes increased about 10 percent. This prompted me to take a look at the St. Louis market to see how it did in comparison and, as the chart below shows, St. Louis has seen a different result with the inventory of homes for sale increasing somewhat in the past year while home prices (on a per square foot basis) remained relatively flat. In January 2012, there were 13,304 homes for sale in the St Louis metro area and today there are 13,758, an increase of 3.4 percent. St Louis metro area home prices per foot are at $95.97 today and were at $95.86 a year ago. Continue Reading →
dennis-norman-realtorIf you have tried to buy a rental property lately in St. Louis then you have discovered you are not alone and the competition for good rental property is quite intense. The reason is simple, experienced investors as well as new ones see real estate as a safe investment and, in many ways, a much better alternative to other investments. Part of the reason for this is the demand for rental housing, brought on as a result of many former homeowners that have been forced, or have chosen, to rent instead of own and “would-be” homeowners that are unable to meet tougher requirements for mortgages thereby forced to remain tenants. Continue Reading →
Shadow Inventory (properties with seriously delinquent mortgages, are in foreclosure or owned by lenders (REO) but not currently listed on the MLS) are a leading indicator of future foreclosure rates so it is good to see that the shadow inventory in the U.S. in October fell to 2.3 million units, a decline of 12.3 percent from a year ago, according to a report from CoreLogic. Continue Reading →
The National Association of REALTORS’ (NAR) Pending Home Sales report for November, 2012 shows home sales increased 1.7 percent in November from the month before and increased 9.8 percent from a year ago. Pending home sales have now increased on a year over year basis for 19 consecutive months, according to NAR.
I don’t know that “hot” comes to mind when I think about any St Louis real estate market today, however, relative to the rest of the market, I think I can identify some St. Louis real estate markets that I feel are poised to perform better in 2013 than other St Louis markets. Below are my charts showing some key market data for the top markets. Included in my data are 4 pieces of information that I think are key to determining the health of a local real estate market:
Home prices – I show what prices have done over Continue Reading →
New home sales in November in the Midwest region were at a seasonally adjusted rate of 49,000 homes, a decrease of 12.5 percent from the month before and a decrease of 5.8 percent from a year ago, according to the new home sales for November 2012 just released by the Commerce Department. The new home sales numbers for the Midwest are in pretty sharp contrast to the national numbers which showed new home sales up 4.4 percent in November from the month before and up 15.3 percent from a year ago Continue Reading →
A panel of 105 professional economic forecasters from all around the country expect home prices to increase 3.1 percent in 2013, according to the December 2012 Zillow Home Price Expectations Survey. Forecasters are more optimistic about home prices than they were just three months earlier when they predicted 2013 home prices would only increase by 2.4 percent. Continue Reading →
The real estate recession and weak economy has not pushed homebuyers into downsizing their next home, at least not according to the results of a survey conducted by national home builder, PulteGroup. In fact, 84 percent of homeowners between the ages of 18 and 59 said they do not have plans to downsize their next home. Recent data from the U.S. Census Bureau supports this notion as well, with the average size of a new home increasing to 2,480 square feet in 2011, an increase of 3.7 percent from the year before. Continue Reading →
Photo by: John Pavelka
Lately we have seen several reports on the housing market that show the housing market is improving and may even be headed toward a recovery however some experts, including Cliff Rossi, Tyser Teaching Fellow and executive-in-residence for the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business, say it may be premature to call this a “real recovery.” Rossi is not entirely negative on the housing market and does admit that home prices are stabilizing and inventories are declining, however he has concerns as a result of the “fiscal cliff”, regulatory reform and tightness of credit, to name a few. Continue Reading →
The National Association of REALTORS® (NAR) announced this morning that U.S. existing home sales increased in November 5.9 percent from the month before and 14.5 percent from the year before. The NAR report indicated the median home price in the U.S. in November was $180,600, an increase of 10.1 percent from a year ago. The St. Louis Real Estate market (the 5-county core St Louis Real Estate area (City of St Louis and the Counties of St Louis, St Charles, Jefferson and Franklin), as my chart below shows, saw home prices rise slightly in November from October to a median price of $122,000 which is an increase of 7.5 percent from a year ago. St Louis home sales in November on the other hand declined slightly from the month before to 2,523 homes but was up 19.6 percent from a year ago Continue Reading →
This morning, the Commerce Department released its new home construction report showing that, on a national basis, all aspects of new home construction, permits, starts and completions, slipped slightly in November 2012 from the month before but were up from a year ago. The Home Builders Association’s new home report shows somewhat better results in St. Louis with permits in St. Louis county up almost 25 percent in November from a year before, nearly a 47 percent increase in St. Charles County, a 1.4 percent increase in Jefferson County and modest decreases in Franklin and Warren County. The city of St. Louis has been hit the hardest with over a 50 percent decline in new home construction from a year ago. Continue Reading →
In a vote of confidence for an improving real estate market, seventy-one percent of homebuyers surveyed by Redfin said they are expecting house prices to increase during the coming year in their neighborhood. Additionally, the survey showed that over half (59 percent) of homebuyers are concerned about the lack of inventory of homes for sale. Here in St. Louis, as the table below shows, we have over 25 zip codes that have a 3 month, or less, supply of homes for sale which is making it more of a challenge for home buyers to find a home they like and supports rising home prices so, if you are one of those home buyers waiting for the “right time to buy”, I wouldn’t wait any longer if I were you. Continue Reading →
There were 1,880 St Louis homeowners that received a foreclosure notice, or were in some stage of the foreclosure process, in November, according to a report from RealtyTrac. This is a 9.37 percent increase from October and is a an increase of over ten (10.52) percent from October 2011. Continue Reading →
I continue to see encouraging news about the housing market and today was no exception. The Freddie Mac housing market outlook for December was released and included a very encouraging outlook for the real estate market in 2013 by its chief economist, Frank Nothaft. Not that I’m on the same level as Northaft, but I will be coming out later this month with a short market recap video for 2012 as well as an outlook for 2013, both specifically for the St Louis real estate market. In the meantime, below are the highlights from Mr Nothaft’s projections for the U.S. Continue Reading →
The St. Louis Real Estate Market continues to show some strength and appears to generally be headed toward recovery, albeit a long slow one. To get the latest St. Louis Real Estate Stats and the latest, best and most comprehensive St Louis Real Estate Data, check out our 5-minute video update below for October for the St Louis real estate market. The update includes charts with up to the date data on the St Louis housing market including St Louis home prices, average time to sell a home in the St Louis area as well as other data and charts to show where the St Louis real estate market is and where it is headed. (Check out all our market update videos on our YouTube Channel – click here. Continue Reading →
The city of St. Louis has experienced a decline in the number of residents since hitting it’s peak population back around 1950. The most recent disappointment came in the 2010 census results showing, in spite of optimism on the part of the city for better numbers, the population of the city of St Louis had declined by nearly another 1o percent during the decade, falling from 348,189 people in 2000 to 319,294 in 2010. During that same decade there were efforts to revitalize the city and bring new life to it as developers built new and fun living spaces by Continue Reading →
The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) released their “Improving Housing Markets Index” for December and I was happy to see St. Louis as a new addition to the list this month! St. Louis was one of 83 new metro areas added to the improving housing markets list from the prior month bringing the total to 201 metro areas as of this month (7 metros were dropped from the month before.) Continue Reading →
There were 1,891 foreclosure sales in St. Louis during the third quarter of 2012, according to a report from RealtyTrac. This is a 46 percent increase from 2nd quarter and a 16 percent increase from the third quarter of 2011. A little under one in five St Louis homes (17.21 percent) that sold during the third quarter of 2012 were foreclosures. The average price St Louis foreclosures sold during third quarter was $102,041 and represented a discount of 37.07 percent from non-foreclosure home sales, according to the report. Continue Reading →
Today, during a presentation addressing the impact of President Obama’s re-election on the housing market by leaders of the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB), David Crowe, PhD., Chief Economist of NAHB, said there is a “fragile” recovery occurring in the housing market and that it could be “affected both directions by the recent election results”. Crowe went on to say that (with regard to the new home market) there has been “no consistent national trend for some time” as the recovery has been from “relatively small and disparate” locations for about a year now and the reason the national numbers are now reflecting this activity is due to the number of these improving small markets increasing significantly. Continue Reading →
“The American Dream” is a phrase we often apply to home ownership although the historian that made this expression popular, James Truslow Adams, defined it differently in his 1931 book Epic of America. According to Wikipedia, in his book Adams defined “The American Dream” as a better and richer life for every man through social order and not material possessions. Regardless of it’s original definition, home ownership became a part of the American dream in the 20th century and, in spite of the fact that we are on the tail-end of about a five year housing slump, the “American Dream” appears to be hanging on as, according to 2011 Census Data, 66.1 percent of Americans own a home and, while this is no doubt a fairly significant decline from the peak of home ownership around the middle part of the decade, it is down only slightly from 2000 when 66.2 percent owned a home. Continue Reading →
The housing market showed more signs of strength in October with pending home sales hitting a five-year high, according to the National Association of REALTORS’ (NAR) Pending Home Sales. According to the report for October, 2012, pending home sales increased 5.2 percent from the month before and increased 13.2 percent from a year ago. Pending home sales have now increased on a year over year basis for 18 consecutive months, according to NAR. Continue Reading →