A slight decline in mortgage rates sent total mortgage application volume up 5.8 percent last week on a seasonally adjusted basis compared to the previous week, the Mortgage Bankers Association reported Wednesday. Applications for home purchases, a gauge of future homebuying activity, rose 7 percent, while refinance applications increased 5 percent, reaching the highest level since December.Still, applications should be much higher, the MBA note
More borrowers are choosing non-banks—financial institutions that only issue loans and do not offer savings or checking accounts—to get a mortgage, The Washington Post reports. It's a major shift in borrower behavior. In 2011, 50 percent of all new mortgage loans originated from the three largest banks: JPMorgan, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo. However, in September 2016, that share plunged to 21 percent.During that time, non-banks emerged
With the cost of building materials jumping 25 percent year over year, according to the National Association of Home Builders' NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index, builders are increasingly concerned about how this will affect home buyers in the new-construction market. In 2016, builders ranked the cost of building materials low on their list of concerns—but now it's one of their top five.The increased cost of lumber is a chief catalyst. "Neg
Millennials have it rough: They're being slapped with a trifecta of housing affordability, credit accessibility, and employment issues, all of which are hampering their ability to buy, according to new report by Bankrate.com. The toughest state of all for millennial buyers may be California, where affordability is low, inventory is severely limited, and workers ages 25 to 34 face high unemployment.Culling data from the National Association of REL
All-cash sales are on the decline, accounting for 32.4 percent of total home sales in November 2016, down 4.5 percentage points year over year, according to CoreLogic's most recent housing data. That's a significant drop from January 2011, when cash sales were at their peak: a whopping 46.6 percent of all home sales nationally. CoreLogic experts predict cash sales will fall to a historical norm of about 25 percent by mid-2017.Cash sales are most
Developers are pouring billions of dollars into giving facelifts to some transit hubs across the country. These improvements are not for expanding traveler capacity but to make these hubs more eye-catching and give commuters a reason to hang out and not just pass through. They're mixing in dining, retail, event offerings, and even the chance to live there.Developers believe that traditional rail and light rail station segments can spur developmen
More high-end home sellers across the country are being forced to offer discounts as the luxury real estate market shows signs of softening, The Wall Street Journal reports."Buyers are very price sensitive," says Donna Olshan, a real estate professional based in Manhattan. "If it's not priced right it's going to sit until the cows come home."Real estate pros and sellers in the luxury market are having to adjust their expectations. In the third qu
MLSListings, a multiple listing service based in Silicon Valley, is staking claim to being the first real estate platform to offer Chinese translation. The MLS says the move was to help remove potential language barriers from the real estate process.MLSListings agents and their clients will now be able to switch between English and Chinese with a click of a button on the platform. Real estate agents also will be able to send translated reports an
Stagnant economic conditions for middle-class America continue to put some real estate markets on uneven ground.NAR’s chief economist Lawrence Yun, who presented his latest economic outlook at the 2017 REALTOR® Broker Summit in San Diego, said lifetime wealth is at an all-time high in the U.S. However, this wealth is highly concentrated in the top 10 percent, while middle-income earners’ wealth has seen relatively no gain over the past 16 ye
Parents are having a tough time saving money. Fifty-one percent of parents recently surveyed say their mortgage was having a “major impact” on their ability to save, according to Bankrate’s Money Pulse survey for February.“It’s probably not as much about the mortgage as it is that stage of life,” says Jonathan Smoke, realtor.com®’s chief economist.Homeowners with children are likely to be in their early 30s to mid 50s and have many
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