The Housing Bubble Blog

A report from NBC Montana. "Nationwide, 2023 saw the lowest number of homes sold in the past 30 years. 'We have to stop the bleeding before an improvement can take place,' Lawrence Yun, an economist with the National Association of Realtors told the crowd at the Gallatin Association of Realtors....

A report from Barron's. "Places where prices have run up the most relative to historic norms are most vulnerable to setbacks, industry experts say. Florida, and Miami in particular, are cases in point. Frustration hangs over the housing market in the Miami area, says Riley Smith, an agent based in...

A weekend topic starting with Go Banking Rates. "A housing bubble can cause property prices to soar to unrealistic levels, leading to an eventual crash that can have detrimental effects on homeowners and the economy. Seth Jacobs, an experienced mortgage broker and founder of Maine USDA Home Loan,...

A weekend topic starting with the Real Deal. "When long-standing rules for negotiating broker commissions were thrown up in the air, buyers were left hanging with questions on how mortgages will factor into the revamped process. Mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are among those clarifying...

It's Friday desk clearing time for this blogger. "Total home sales fell more than 4% in March, the National Association of Realtors said Thursday. Lawrence Yun, the association's chief economist, said in the report rising job numbers suggest there are more aspiring home buyers in the market now...

A report from ABC 7 in California. "A former HGTV star and house flipper from Los Gatos has been sentenced to four years in Santa Clara County Jail. On Tuesday, Charles 'Todd' Hill, star of the show 'Flip It to Win It,' was ordered to pay close to $10 million for real estate and financial fraud....

A report from the New York Post. "Homeownership has been a monetary nightmare for this woman, and now she’s warning others. Internet creator Samantha Barker was in good financial standing before she bought her first house, but purchasing property 'has ruined me financially,' she shared in a viral...

A report from Bangor Daily News. "In several surprising areas of Maine, the housing market appears to be slightly cooling after years of soaring sale prices. A huge, pandemic-era wave of in-migration has since settled, and high interest rates — expected to top 7 percent in the coming weeks — mean...

A report from Newsweek. "A condominium in downtown San Francisco, an area that's been rocked by several problems in the past few years, was sold last week for about half of its purchase price in 2019, as shown on Zillow. The property, a two-bedroom, two-bathroom condo on 1075 Market St, a...

A report from the Pueblo Chieftain in Colorado. "New residential real estate figures released this week indicate Pueblo's market is not showing signs of significant improvement during the first three months of the year. The median sales price fell 4.7% in March and is down 1.3% year to date at...

A weekend topic starting with the Pagosa Daily Post. "As Colorado policymakers step up their efforts to address the state’s housing shortage, they’re encountering a similar problem: Colorado’s housing market, and the state and local policies that shape it, don’t always behave like they should....

It's Friday desk clearing time for this blogger. "Mortgage rates again rose to nearly 7%, a key psychological threshold that threatens the housing revival that many had hoped for this year. Catherine Hicks purchased a three-bedroom home in St. Petersburg, Fla., in January, with a 7.1% mortgage...

A report from the Bangor Daily News. "This time last year, Jordan Stolt would have had no problem finding an eager buyer for her $310,000 listing in central Maine. It’s a solid starter home on Winslow’s Roy Street. The 1,000-square-foot home is well below Maine’s average value, making the cost no...

A report from the Mercury News in California. "In an opportunity most would-be Bay Area homeowners can only dream about, a handful of buyers snagged nine condominiums in a downtown San Jose housing tower at auction — paying an eye-popping average of just $31,900 each. Despite hot tempers and court...

A report from NBC 2. "The housing market has slowed considerably this winter, a time when sales increase in Southwest Florida. It seems to have gone from a seller's market to a buyer's market almost overnight. Currently, in Lee County alone, there are more than 6,000 properties up for sale and many...

A report from Lew Sichelman. "If you have a fixed-rate mortgage, your payments will always stay the same, right? Wrong. Maybe you’ve heard the term PITI, which stands for the main components of a typical mortgage payment: principal, interest, taxes and insurance. And while the 'P' and the first 'I'...

A report from the New York Post. "Some of the Big Apple’s ritziest ZIP codes are seeing home values plummet amid the sustained exodus from the city caused by the pandemic, spiraling crime and ballooning taxes, experts told The Post. 10013, which encompasses parts of Tribeca and Soho, dropped from...

A weekend topic starting with the Globe and Mail. "A short three-hour flight from Vancouver, it’s possible to walk off the plane and glide into vacation mode within minutes. The B.C. connection with Palm Springs, Calif., is a long-standing one, especially for those who took advantage of the plunge...

It's Friday desk clearing time for this blogger. "Mountain Green condo owners voted in favor of a $50 million assessment to bring the building into the 21st Century, but some longtime owners said their quarterly payments will be so high they can’t afford it and they will be forced out. Helen Werns,...

A report from Realtor.com. "The Austin, TX, housing market boomed during the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2022, Ben Brajtbord, 38, and his girlfriend, Emily Sawyer, 34, started house hunting in Austin when the local market was still on fire. The first-time homebuyers figured it wouldn't get any easier to...