A weekend topic starting with the Associated Press. "The Petersen family’s two-bedroom apartment in northern California is starting to feel small. Four-year-old Jerrik's toy monster trucks are everywhere in the 1,100-square-foot unit in Campbell, just outside of San Jose. And it's only a matter of time before 9-month-old Carolynn starts amassing more toys, says her mother, Jenn Petersen. The 42-year-old chiropractor had hoped she and her husband, Steve, a 39-year-old dental hygienist, would have bought a house by now. But when they can afford a bigger place, it will have to be another rental. Petersen has done the math: With mortgage rates and home prices stubbornly high, there's no way the couple, who make about $270,000 a year and pay about $2,500 in monthly rent, can afford a home anywhere in their area."

"According to October data from the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, a San Jose family with a median income of $156,700 would need to spend 80% of their income on housing — including an $8,600 monthly mortgage payment — to own a median-priced $1.54 million home. The issue is widespread and near historic highs nationally: As of last fall, the median homeowner in the U.S. was paying 42% of their income on homeownership costs, according to the Atlanta Fed. Four years ago, that percentage was 28% and had not previously reached 38% since late 2007, just before the housing market crash. 'I used to subscribe to the idea that owning a house is just a natural milestone you have to reach,' she said. 'At some point, though, what are you sacrificing by just owning a house and gaining equity? I want to be able to travel with my kids. I want to be able to sign them up for extracurriculars. How are we supposed to do that if we're paying a mortgage that's most of our take-home pay?'"

The Aspen Times in Colorado. "Aspen’s real estate market is stabilizing with a slight increase in unit sales, while Snowmass Village experiences strong appreciation and a surge in new condo offerings, according to Tim Estin, a real estate broker with Aspen Snowmass Sotheby’s. Median home prices in Aspen have held steady at $13.4 million after a previous 14% decline, while condo prices have risen 5% to $2.85 million. The price per square foot is normalizing at higher price points, with 40% of active listings priced above $4,000 per square foot — a threshold once reserved for only a select few properties."

"The highest price per square foot — $8,215 — was achieved by a $43 million penthouse at Monarch on the Park. In 2019, before COVID-19, the highest sale was $23 million at $3,018 per square foot, with the top price per square foot being $3,960 for a West End historic home. Today, Estin said properties exceeding $5,000 per square foot are more common, reinforcing Aspen’s status in the ultra-luxury market. 'Prices have increased by 2.5 to 3 times more since COVID-19,' Estin said."

Yahoo Finance on Colorado. "It’s a good time to be a renter in Denver. Throughout the city and its suburbs, rents are falling and newly constructed buildings are dangling an array of incentives for signing new leases: offers of six, eight, or even 10 weeks free are now common, brokers say, as are other perks like discounted parking and gift cards. The relief comes after a construction boom added tens of thousands of new units to the metro area last year alone, largely in its urban core. 'Everybody that wanted to move here because of remote work has moved here,' said Brian Sanchez, CEO of Denver Apartment Finders, a locator service. 'The demand is not keeping up with the supply.'"

"Rents for apartments of up to two bedrooms in the Denver metro area dropped 5.9% last year, according to Realtor.com. That’s a faster decrease than several other onetime hotspots for pandemic-era migration and construction, like Austin and Nashville. There, rents fell 5% and 4.4%, respectively in 2024. Broker Colin Stok said he recently showed a friend new apartment options, including one offering 10 weeks of free rent and free parking. When the friend’s current rental company found out he was looking, it agreed to match the incentives in exchange for a lease renewal. 'They’re trying to keep people in buildings,' said Stok."

News 4 in Texas. "A new affordable housing complex is now leasing in San Antonio. But how does affordable housing in San Antonio compare to other cities? Renter Betsy Calderon says she has heard about low rent prices in San Antonio. According to rent.com they average around $1,000 dollars for a studio apartment and roughly $1,100 for a one-bedroom. Kayla Miranda, Director of the Coalition for Tenant Justice, says according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition those making the least amount of money are still spending a substantial amount of their income on rent and utilities."

"'So people are just like putting up with it. They're choosing between medication and food and paying the rent,' Miranda said. And she says the reason why these people are struggling is that we aren't comparing local wages with other cities wages. 'Well, if you're from California, San Antonio rents are amazing! They're so low,' Miranda said."

The Palm Beach Post. "Nearly one in five condo buildings in Palm Beach County that are covered by the state's new safety-inspection law have failed to submit even initial reports. Commissioner Maria Sachs said her concern was that imposing fines could place more stress on owners who already cannot afford to pay the assessments being levied for the needed repairs. The Florida Policy Project has released a report noting that some owners may face eviction, or the building could be condemned as a result of assessments that are being levied to repair aging buildings. The report estimates there are 1.1 million condo units in Florida in buildings older than 30 years. They are concentrated in just eight counties — Broward, Miami-Dade, Palm Beach, Pinellas, Collier, Sarasota, Hillsborough, and Manatee. Nearly 160,000 are in Palm Beach County. Listings have significantly increased for those units. West Palm Beach, according to the report, saw a year-over year increase in listings of 52%, one of the highest in Florida."

"The Post reported last year that several condo buildings were found to be so unsafe that inhabitants had to be evacuated. One was in St. Lucie County where an inspector made a frantic 911-type call to the Fire Marshall saying that a building at the Villa Del Sol condo complex was in danger of collapsing. Residents there continue to be barred from entering their units while restoration work takes place. Residents at Villa Del Sol are struggling to cope with assessments of more than $100,000."

Click Orlando in Florida. "Home prices are up, fewer people are buying, and the market is balanced, according to a 2024 breakdown of Central Florida’s housing market by the Orlando Regional Realtor Association. The median home price in 2024 was $385,000, an all-time high and a 3.9% increase year-over-year. Total sales, though, fell 7.1% compared to 2023, based on data the association pulls from Orange, Osceola, Lake and Seminole counties. As sales dropped and more homes spent time on the market, inventory reached a six-month supply for the first time since 2011."

"News 6 sat down with Orlando Regional Realtor Association president Lawrence Bellido. What’s the outlook for Central Florida’s housing market this year? 'The interest rates are going to adjust and they’re going to cool off. We could see them go a bit lower, but we’re not going to have our historical interest rates from the Covid period. That’s not going to happen. I don’t think that’s going to happen again in our lifetime.'"

"Do you feel like that’s the biggest obstacle that first-time homebuyers face? That downpayment assistance and that big money up-front? 'Actually, I don’t think that’s a big obstacle. All they have to do is protect their credit. There are so many programs out there that require little out-of-pocket depending on a customer’s situation. The only negative would be if they’re not talking to people or they’re looking at the wrong article or something that says there’s doom and gloom when that’s not really true.'"

"What about someone looking to sell? 'Sellers are going to have to be a little bit more aggressive when it comes to staging, curb appeal and doing some updates to make sure their homes can sell.'"

The Globe and Mail. "There is a common narrative that if Vancouver, for example, were to greatly increase its supply of new housing, prices would come down. The problem, goes the theory, is that Vancouver is just not building enough. But that’s not quite the story, say economists Paul Beaudry and Jeremy Kronick, who just released a paper titled Making Housing More Affordable in Canada: The Need for More Large Cities, for the C.D. Howe Institute."

"It won’t be easy to grow a jobs market when we’ve been invested so thoroughly in real estate for so long. For Canadians, the incentives of real estate investment have shone brighter than most others. 'I’d say some of the more entrepreneurial kind of talent gets put into housing in Canada, because that’s been the best option. And that’s not a great place to put all our talent,' said Mr. Beaudry. 'We’re doing a lot of building and it’s consuming a lot of resources, but we’re not, at the end of the day, going to satisfy housing demand,' said Mr. Watt, who believes part of the problem is the presale financing of the condo market."

"Instead of responding to demand from end-users, the presale housing market responded to demand from investors who put up the money on presale units. That money financed construction and investors reaped the gains of rising housing prices. But the units favoured by investors are small, suitable as rentals. 'Nobody wants to live in a dog crate sized condo,' said Economist David Watt, who is based in Toronto, where new condo units last year had been empty for months. 'We were building a lot, and we were just not satisfying demand. And right now, we’re sort of seeing the folly of what happened. … It was a slow-moving train wreck. You could see it happening years ago. We just didn’t do anything about it because it didn’t seem to ever be a problem. And now it’s a problem. … Well, you know what? The solution is going to take years and it’s going to be difficult.'"

"David Williams, vice-president of policy for the Business Council of B.C., and former senior economist for the Bank of Canada, says part of the problem is that the incentives are there to invest in real estate over income growth. Home ownership has less tax burden and greater opportunity for building wealth. It’s no wonder that when the interest rate dropped during the pandemic consumers took on historically high levels of mortgage debt. Mortgage debt went from around $1.6-trillion leveraged against housing stock to $2.1-trillion, said Mr. Williams. But there was no way that housing supply could possibly keep up, so the restricted supply of resale homes shot up in value."

"'Because we’ve had this mortgage credit boom that’s gone on for a very long time, we’ve expanded our housing finance system. So that’s meant that our homes are going up in value. … People have been prepared to accept low productivity growth in Canada because their personal wealth is going up because of their existing real estate. It’s just not a coincidence that we’re the most indebted in the world. We borrowed the most against those assets. So, of course those assets are more expensive.'"

Global News in Canada. "After about four years of frustration, a Brampton, Ont. man and his wife finally got back their 32nd -floor Toronto waterfront condo apartment unit after their tenant was removed by the Sheriff. For Narinder Singh, the long-awaited eviction was a relief. 'I’m at a loss for words, this has been a harrowing experience,' said Singh, interviewed minutes after the eviction had taken place. Singh says he is owed the money after the tenant, Deeqa Rafle, inconsistently paid rent at various times over a four-year period. He says she also failed to pay some utilities that were registered in his name. According to Singh, he calculates he’s owed $55,177.85."

"'The non-payment of rent can financially destroy small landlords. We have seen some of our members lose their investment homes and even their primary residences to power of sale after failing to keep up with mortgage payments,'said Varun Sriskanda, a member of Small Ownership Landlords of Ontario’s board of directors. 'Most of the small landlords I speak to handle the situation by getting a second job, using their savings, taking out a line of credit or refinancing their property to take out equity — anything to stay afloat,. On a regular basis I hear stories of small landlords that are continuing to fall victim to unscrupulous tenants.'"

"Singh says he and his wife saved 'penny by penny' to purchase the condo apartment as an investment for their eventual retirement. Singh doesn’t believe he’ll be reimbursed for the outstanding rent. According to Sriskanda, landlords who’ve had serious issues with tenants or who’ve heard about the risks are reallocating their money into safer investments. 'The bigger issue is who this really hurts, and that’s the tenants,' he said. 'The risks are too high, and small landlords are bearing the brunt of Ontario’s housing crisis.'"

The Geelong Advertiser in Australia. "Geelong home values were off to a slow start in 2025 as the glut of homes fuelled by rising property taxes saw the median home price dip in January. The city’s median house price dropped 1.3 per cent to $756,000 over three months as a decline in January ended several months of positive growth. The overall decline follows Melbourne and regional Victoria, which also saw values retreat in January. The median house value in Geelong is 4.7 per cent lower than the same time last year as PropTrack senior economist Eleanor Creagh said Victoria’s property market was weaker as elevated stock levels gave buyers more choice and less reason to transact urgently. 'It’s likely accumulated listings are driving some of that weakness,' Mr Creagh said."

"Buxton director Ben Riddle said the property market was so far 'out of whack' high stock levels and low buyer participation due to the unprecedented amount of manipulation from government decisions, such as raising land taxes and policies targeting property ownership. Mr Riddle said while the data shows the median house value is 4 per cent lower, year on year, it doesn’t show the people who can’t sell their home who have cut more than 10 per cent off their asking price to try and find a buyer. 'Where it’s out of whack is the people that aren’t ultimately wealthy have been forced to put property on the market in unfavourable times because they can’t actually afford to hold it.'"