Salient to Investors: Cash transactions accounted for 24% versus 33% a year ago. Investors, 63% of whom paid cash, were 14% of the market last month versus 19% in September 2013. Foreclosures and short sales were 10% of the total. First-time buyers accounted for 29% versus the historical average of 40%. The average
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Jan Hatzius at Goldman Sachs said: Home construction will grow 10% to 15% by 2015-2016, while capital spending will fall to 5%, a reminder of how very different this recovery is. It is unusual for a housing recovery to lag a capital-spending recovery. Gains in business investment
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Analysing what parts of the market have lots of ground to make up to reclaim highs is a good way to gauge how much more the market can rise or fall. The NYSE Arca Airline Index is 59 percent below its peak. The S&P 500 Information Technology
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Thomas Simons at Jefferies said new-home sales have no traction whatsoever but overall housing data is encouraging, with everything moving in the right direction, though a little more slowly. New-home sales are tabulated when contracts are signed, and so are a more timely barometer than transactions on existing homes.
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Jay Morelock at FTN Financial said the ‘big recovery’ has turned out not to be, and expects a stabilization but not a crash or acceleration. Brad Hunter at Metrostudy said starts in the South may have been hurt by a shortage of buildable lots as development was
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Zillow expects 5 percent mortgages by year-end and the 10 places where the percentage of monthly income will be pushed furthest above the average are, in order: Stockton, Ca – where the median price of a home will rise 22.8 percent by September. Honolulu, Ha – where
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Ryan Sweet at Moody’s Analytics said conditions for stronger growth are falling into place for early 2014, and housing will kick in and spur faster growth. Michelle Girard at RBS Securities expects the shopping season to be OK as employment growth of around 200,000 jobs a month
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Warren Buffett said the US housing market is coming back but housing starts are not at an equilibrium point, where they match household formation. Buffett said housing will rebound because of increasing population and limited supply. Buffett said the US has made significant progress since 2009 after
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Mark Hanson at Hanson Advisers, who predicted the 2007 housing crash, said: Housing prices will decline 20 percent in housing prices in the next 12 months due to rising interest rates and less speculative private-equity buyers. Half of the gains since the bottom in 2011 could be
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: 30-year mortgage rates were at 4.86 percent last week. Robert Bostrom at Greenberg Traurig said the Fed finally realized that housing is fading in anticipation of the tapering and even higher rates, and could not taper without irreparable damage to the housing recovery. Anish Lohokare and Timi
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