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Denver Is Not On This List
Zillow just released 2 important lists for the 50 largest metro areas in the country—The 10 Most Affordable Markets for Homebuyers and the 10 Least Affordable Markets for Homebuyers. This report was based on the following factors—population, the number of homes for sale, each area’s Zillow Home Value Index (median price basically), and the share…
66% of Coloradans Are Working
The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics just released their Employment-Population Ratio for each state for 2017. This report measures the number of people aged 16-64 who are actively working for a company or self-employed. It doesn’t include people looking for work, students, military, or people living in prisons or mental health hospitals. For Colorado our…
Attached Home Prices Rise $50k
Here are the results of the 7 country Metro Denver housing report for February. Here are the highlights— Buyers purchased 2,990 homes and condos last month, which was down 2.8% from a year ago. Owners put 4,381 new homes and condos on the market last month, a 1.3% increase from last February and a 7.4%…
Is a ROI of 1100% Enough For You?
Imagine you have first-time home buyers who are paying about $1800 a month in rent and they want to keep their mortgage payment the same. Thus, they can buy a $300k home with 5% down for that payment roughly. Let’s assume they own their home for 10 years. How much wealth will they create for…
Will Rates Drop Soon Like They Did Last Year?
At the SMDRA Statistics Committee we talked last week about mortgage rate trends during each of the last several years. So, I reviewed the average monthly mortgage rates for the last 9 years since the Fed introduced their Zero Interest Rate Policy and I noticed rates peaked in the first quarter 5 times. However, I…
Is Metro Denver’s Housing Market Failing?
This was the headline in the Denver Post last Tuesday after a report from HSH.com, a mortgage research firm showed that the median price of a home was $414k in the 4th quarter and a borrower needed to make $79,181 to qualify to buy that home with 20% down, assuming that their house payment doesn’t…
Disappointing New Home Sales
Sales of new single-family houses in January 2018 were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 593,000, according to estimates released jointly today by the U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. This is 7.8% below the revised December rate of 643,000 and is 1.0%below the January 2017 estimate of 599,000.…
A Bill To Help Our Housing Crisis?
Our State House passed House Bill 1127 last week and this bill seeks to help ease Colorado’s housing crisis according to the Bill’s sponsors. Here is what the Bill actually does— Requires CO landlords to tell their perspective tenants more about their application costs and requirements for approval, such as rental history, credit histories, and…
2 Myths About Buying a Home
NeighborWorks America surveyed people in 2017 and asked them what is the minimum required down payment to buy a home? On average, these people said 17%. In a second survey done by an Ellie Mae Borrower Insights Survey found that 29% of renters think at least a 700 Fico Score is required to qualify for…
New Home Supply Down 50% from 2006
I listened in on a webinar from MetroStudy last week that focused on the Rocky Mountain region. Mark Boud, their chief economist estimates that home builders will complete 1.25 million homes this year, the same amount they built in 1992, when 68 million FEWER people lived here. Ouch! Mark also estimates that nationally there is…
Why Builders Are Not Building Affordable Apartments
In our country’s 150 largest cities, builders completed 395k new apartments in 2017, a whopping 46% increase from 2016 and the highest level seen in 40 years. And luxury, upscale apartments accounted for between 75-80% of the new supply. So, what’s keeping builders from building more affordable apartments? Land, material and labor costs are rising…
Our Fastest Growing Employment Sector Is…
According to the Metro Denver Economic Development Corporation report, the fastest growing job sector in in metro Denver over the last 5 years has been software and IT development, which has grown by 32% in the last 5 years from 44,084 jobs in 2012 to 58,190 jobs last year. We now have the 8th highest…
