Rollingwood, another town west of Austin, has a new ban on short-term leases.
Owners are angry about the city's vote to take away their right to rent their homes out for fewer than 30 days - citing constitutional rights to do what they wish with their property and also the need for extra income during the recession.
However, the city of Rollingwood, which is doggedly determined to remain its' own entity despite it's being nestled right next to Austin's Zilker park, sees the ban as a way to limit residents to home owners and more permanent residents as opposed to turning the village into a temporary resort town for those more interested in what Austin has to offer.
Could Lakeway be next? Visit my website for more information about home sales in Austin and the Lake Travis area.
Showing posts with label home sales. Show all posts
Showing posts with label home sales. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
Monday, October 4, 2010
Texas Foreclosures less than 50% of nat'l avg.
Monday, July 27, 2009
Fed moves to curb housing abuses
The U.S. central bank recommends new rules to limit compensation for mortgage brokers and clarify risks for borrowers.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- The Federal Reserve Board Thursday recommended new disclosure rules for homeowners and compensation guidelines for mortgage brokers to correct some abuses of the recent runaway housing market.
Prospective borrowers would receive a one-page notice of key questions about their loan and see a graph comparing their interest rate to that of a low-risk borrower, the Fed said.
Mortgage brokers would not receive greater compensation if they put a borrower into a high-cost loan, under the rules.
"Consumers need the proper tools to determine whether a particular mortgage loans is appropriate for their circumstances," Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke said during an open meeting of the board.View the original article here or visit my website for more news about the Texas real estate market.
Thursday, July 23, 2009
Nation's Home Sales Seeing Increase
Existing-Home Sales Up Again
Washington, July 23, 2009
Existing-home sales rose for the third consecutive month with inventory easing and home prices declining less sharply in June, according to the National Association of Realtors®.
Existing-home sales – including single-family, townhomes, condominiums and co-ops – increased 3.6 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate1 of 4.89 million units in June from a downwardly revised pace of 4.72 million in May, but are 0.2 percent lower than the 4.90 million-unit level in June 2008.
Lawrence Yun, NAR chief economist, is hopeful about the gain. “The increase in existing-home sales occurred in all major regions of the country,” he said. “We expect a gradual uptrend in sales to continue due to tax credit incentives and historically high affordability conditions. Despite the rise in closed transactions, many Realtors® are reporting lost sales as a result of new appraisal standards that went into effect May 1 of this year.”
A June survey of NAR members shows 37 percent experienced at least one lost sale as a result of the new Home Valuation Code of Conduct, with seven out of 10 reporting an increased use of out-of-area appraisers. Seventy percent of NAR appraiser members said consumers were paying higher fees, while 85 percent report a perceived reduction in appraisal quality.
“Clearly the process needs to be revised, but the most logical approach is to use appraisers with local expertise, industry designations and access to local data, who make a physical examination of the property and use apples-to-apples comparisons with nearby home sales,” Yun said. “In many cases, normal homes are being compared with distressed homes sold at a discount, which often are in subpar condition – this is causing real harm to both buyers and sellers.”
According to Freddie Mac, the national average commitment rate for a 30-year, conventional, fixed-rate mortgage rose to 5.42 percent in June from 4.86 percent in May; the rate was 6.32 percent in June 2008. Mortgage interest rates have trended lower in recent weeks.
Total housing inventory at the end of June fell 0.7 percent to 3.82 million existing homes available for sale, which represents a 9.4-month supply2 at the current sales pace, down from a 9.8-month supply in May. Raw inventory totals are 14.9 percent below a year ago.
“This is another hopeful sign – if we can keep the volume of sales above the level of new inventory, prices could stabilize in many areas around the end of the year,” Yun said.
An NAR practitioner survey in June showed first-time buyers accounted for 29 percent of transactions, unchanged from May, and that the number of buyers looking at homes is up nearly 12 percentage points from June 2008.
NAR President Charles McMillan, a broker with Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage in Dallas-Fort Worth, said there are very good opportunities. “Despite some of the challenges, the housing market continues to demonstrate signs of recovery,” he said. “The temporary first-time buyer tax credit is clearly helping people make a decision and is contributing to the overall stimulus impact, but since it’s taking longer to close transactions, many would-be beneficiaries may not be able to take advantage of the credit before the December 1 expiration date. As a consequence, consumers need the expertise of Realtors® more than ever to navigate both the obstacles and opportunities in today’s market.”
The national median existing-home price3 for all housing types was $181,800 in June, which is 15.4 percent below June 2008. Distressed properties, which accounted for 31 percent of sales in June, continue to downwardly distort the median price because they generally sell at a discount relative to traditional homes.
Single-family home sales rose 2.4 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.32 million in June from a level of 4.22 million in May, and are 0.2 percent higher than the 4.31 million-unit pace a year ago. The median existing single-family home price was $181,600 in June, which is 15.0 percent below June 2008.
Existing condominium and co-op sales jumped 14.0 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 570,000 units in June from 500,000 in May, but are 3.1 percent below the 588,000-unit level in June 2008. The median existing condo price4 was $183,300 in June, down 18.9 percent from a year ago.
Regionally, existing-home sales in the Northeast rose 2.5 percent to an annual pace of 820,000 in June, but are 4.7 percent below a year ago. The median price in the Northeast was $249,400, down 5.9 percent from June 2008.
Existing-home sales in the Midwest increased 0.9 percent in June to a level of 1.10 million but are 1.8 percent lower than June 2008. The median price in the Midwest was $157,000, which is 9.1 percent below a year ago.
In the South, existing-home sales rose 4.0 percent to an annual pace of 1.81 million in June but are 3.7 percent below a year ago. The median price in the South was $163,200, down 11.9 percent from June 2008.
Existing-home sales in the West improved by 6.4 percent to an annual rate of 1.16 million in June, and are 11.5 percent higher than June 2008. The median price in the West was $214,800, which is 24.9 percent below a year ago.
The National Association of Realtors®, “The Voice for Real Estate,” is America’s largest trade association, representing 1.2 million members involved in all aspects of the residential and commercial real estate industries.
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View the original article here. For more information about buying or selling your home, or advice about the real estate market, visit my website.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Which cities will and won’t recover fastest -- Austin at the top, AGAIN!
WASHINGTON - The three most important things in real estate: location, location, location.
It's true for recovery from a real estate bubble too. Overall, many economists expect the national economy to return to growth later in 2009, perhaps as soon as this summer. But that won't be the case everywhere. While some cities are poised for a quick rebound, others face a slog to recovery that could take years.
Poised for swift recovery are many Texas cities, such as Austin, San Antonio, Dallas and McAllen. These areas did not see the massive real estate bubble that formed in states like California, Nevada and Florida. The economy is diverse, with heavy growth coming from education and health care in recent years.
Many of the cities with the longest road to recovery are California cities, where home prices rocketed out of control, and entire economies were supported largely by a real estate bubble. Fresno, Modesto, Salinas, Bakersfield, Stockton and Los Angeles all saw home prices soar to unsustainable levels and then begin their inevitable plunge. The collapse of the housing markets pushed unemployment rates in these cities above 10 percent.
Even as a flood of foreclosures makes home prices look affordable again, a sign that some of the worst real estate markets may be finding their bottom, it will still take years for unemployment rates as high as 16.8 percent in Modesto or 15.5 percent in Fresno to return to healthy levels.
To find the 10 cities that look best poised for recovery (and the 10 cities likely looking at the longest climb back), we examined estimates from data provider Moody's Economy.com of the projected gross domestic product of metropolitan areas across the U.S., as well as unemployment figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and home prices, incomes and affordability data from the National Association of Home Builders. Because, in general, healthy cities were not victims of as severe a housing collapse, home prices were not used in ranking the cities poised for recovery.
The analysis also shows the importance of a city's economic make-up. Manufacturing has been battered by the recession, leaving cities like Detroit and Flint, Mich., or Youngstown, Ohio, with bad unemployment and a changing economy that's unlikely to replace the lost jobs. Moody's projects the economy in Flint, for example, will decrease by 16 percent from the start of recession to the end of 2010. (One commonly cited rule of thumb for depression is a decline of 10 percent.) Flint might never return to its original size.
New York City, too, once the capital of finance, is now saddled with Wall Street-induced unemployment and homes that are completely unaffordable for most of the region's residents. The NAHB's Housing Opportunity Index reports that only 14 percent of homes in the New York-White Plains-Wayne area are affordable on the area's median income — by far the least affordable region measured by NAHB.
Cities with robust technology sectors are poised for stronger recoveries than manufacturing or finance centers. Cities with high-tech capabilities like Seattle, Huntsville, Ala., or Boulder, Colo., could see quick recovery in coming months.
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Austin home sales hit highest level in a year
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Austin-area sales of existing homes hit the highest level in a year last month, according to figures Monday from the Austin Board of Realtors.
Last month, 2,135 single-family homes were sold in the area, down 4 percent from a year earlier. That was the smallest decline since a 2 percent drop in July 2007, when the market began to soften amid an emerging national mortgage crisis.
This year, sales were down 19 percent in May and 18 percent in April from a year earlier.
Pending sales — those in the pipeline to close in July — were up 4 percent, to 2,084.
"We've seen the year-over-year gap in sales volume close steadily throughout 2009, and that momentum continues this month," said Jay Gohil, chairman of the Board of Realtors.
Jim Gaines, research economist for the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M, said there's not yet a clear signal that the Austin market has hit bottom.
"That's the $64 million question," he said.
He said Texas is seeing more signs that the recession has landed with full force, such as a weakening job market — including in Central Texas — and falling sales tax revenue.
But there is growing evidence nationwide that the housing market is starting to stabilize. Combined, sales of new and existing homes hit an annual rate of 5.1 million in May, the highest level this year.
In Central Texas, the market is benefiting from low mortgage rates and a healthy supply of homes for sale. Another strong incentive: an $8,000 federal tax credit for first-time buyers who close on a home before Dec. 1.
But the market faces a long climb back. Home sales last month were down 23 percent from June 2007.
Mark Sprague, Austin partner for Residential Strategies Inc., which tracks the housing market, said the Austin market appears to be improving.
As fewer developers build homes and the number of available lots continues to shrink, it will mean more demand for existing homes, he said.
"Resales are a little better," Sprague said. "I'm cautiously optimistic."
Sprague reiterated that the Austin market has not slumped as deeply as the national market. The median home price in Austin last month was $199,900, unchanged from a year ago. Nationwide in May, the latest data available, prices were down 15 percent from a year earlier.
Mortgage broker Ashley Hall said June was a busy month for her firm, with a large percentage of homebuyers looking to move to Austin from destinations such as California and Arizona.
"We have seen a great deal of activity," said Hall, president of Barton Hills Mortgage.
Hall said her firm saw purchases increase about 15 percent in June. Of those, 60 percent were buyers moving from other cities or states, and 40 percent were previous customers moving to bigger or better homes. The average purchase price was in the $450,000-to-$500,000 range, with a few sales over $1 million.
Tom Polk, a broker associate with Stanberry & Associates, said June's figures finally reflect what he's been seeing in his own business.
Polk said he's also received interest from prospective homeowners looking to move to Austin as well as investors.
"It's about time," he said. "There is a distinct change in activity and attitude out on the street."
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Read the original post here or learn more about Austin, Hill Country, and Lakeway home sales on my website.
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