US home prices post 18.1 percent annual drop in April

There is a clear trend home prices declines are moderating — another sign the beleaguered housing market is stabilizing, according to data released Tuesday. While the Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller index of 20 major cities tumbled by 18.1 percent, it marked the third straight month the decline was not a record. And yearly losses in 13 metros improved compared to March. "The stock market bottomed in March and measures of consumer confidence have turned upward. This report shows that these better spirits are also appearing in the housing market," said David M. Blitzer, chairman of the S&P index committee. Eight of the 20 metro posted price gains from March, with Dallas recording the largest increase at 1.7 percent. And every city except Charlotte showed some kind of improvement month-over-month.

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Data suggest more moving out of Fla.

Once the dream of many a retiree and young person seeking to live in paradise, the prospect of living in Florida seems to be less attractive in the current economic downturn. Data from moving companies and the Florida Department of Motor Vehicles suggest that fewer people are moving to the state and, at the very least, an equal number of residents are moving out. Atlas Van Lines moved a total of 5,277 households into the state in 2008, but moved out 6,367 households, according to the moving company’s migration study. Those numbers compare with the 9,069 households moving into Florida and the 7,180 moving out in 2004, when the state’s real estate market was just heating up.

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Meltdown 101: Where do home prices really stand?

Is the historic U.S. housing market crash close to being over, or is the end still far, far away? While sales finally seem to be stabilizing, prices are still are likely to keep sinking well into next year and maybe longer. Prices have been cut in half in Las Vegas and Phoenix, according to one popular home price measurement. But statistics like these mask the many complexities involved in trying to measure U.S. home prices. Every home price gauge captures a somewhat different slice of the housing market, even when they all depict the same general trend. Also, all real estate is local — some neighborhoods have largely escaped the housing bust, and price declines can vary sharply within a single metro area. In many parts of the country, faraway suburbs, where many buyers moved into new subdivisions and stretched to qualify for mortgages, have been hit harder than established, wealthy enclaves.

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State Farm clients needn't panic yet

When Gov. Charlie Crist rejected a bill Wednesday that would have let national companies charge whatever they wish for property insurance in Florida, he said that it lacked enough consumer protections. That veto, however, ensures that State Farm Florida will abandon the state's property insurance market, company officials said. What happens now for State Farm's policyholders? Nothing - yet. Early this year, after Insurance Commissioner Kevin McCarty rejected the company's request to raise its rates 47 percent, State Farm announced its decision to leave. The company submitted an exit plan, which McCarty rejected, calling it "hazardous" for policyholders. The insurer then filed an appeal with the state Department of Administrative Hearings and still is negotiating with McCarty on a withdrawal strategy. Until the litigation or negotiations conclude, the company cannot take any action to withdraw.

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US New-Home Sales Nearly Flat in May

Sales of new homes were virtually flat in May, compared to April, but down about one-third from the number of sales during the same period a year ago, the Commerce Department reported Wednesday. Home sales slid .6 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 342,000. The number of new homes for sale declined 2.3 percent to 292,000, a 10.2-month supply. The decline in new-home sales was entirely focused on the South, where sales fell 8.5 percent for the month. Meanwhile, sales of new homes gained 1.3 percent in the West and posted double-digit gains of 28.6 percent and 18.6 percent in the Northeast and Midwest, respectively.

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Mortgage Rates Mostly Flat Amid Mixed Economic News

The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage (FRM) averaged 5.42 percent with an average 0.7 point for the week ending June 25, 2009, up from last week when it averaged 5.38 percent. Last year at this time, the 30-year FRM averaged 6.45 percent.

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US Existing-Home Sales Continue to Rise

Sales of existing homes showed another gain in May, benefiting from favorable affordability conditions and a first-time buyer tax credit, according to the NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS ®. May’s increase was the first back-to-back monthly gain since September 2005. Existing-home sales – including single-family, townhomes, condominiums and co-ops – rose 2.4 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.77 million units in May from a downwardly revised level of 4.66 million units in April. Sales remained 3.6 percent below the 4.95 million-unit pace in May 2008. However, the increase in sales is less than expected because poor appraisals are stalling transactions. Pending home sales indicated much stronger activity, but some contracts are falling through from faulty valuations that keep buyers from getting a loan. Total housing inventory at the end of May fell 3.5 percent to 3.80 million existing homes available for sale, which represents a 9.6-month supply at the current sales pace, down from a 10.1-month supply in April.

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Tampa Area May Home Sales Down 1%, Prices Down 20%

The Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater MSA reported a total of 2,243 homes sold in April compared to 2,270 homes a year ago for a 1 percent decrease. The existing home median sales price was $141,100; a year ago, it was $176,100 for a 20 percent decrease. The average home price is up 15% from the low point in January 2009 of $122,400. In the year-to-year comparison for the existing condo market, a total of 596 units sold in the MSA last month, up 17% from a year ago when 511 condos sold. The market’s existing condo median price was $107,500; a year ago, it was $159,800 for a 33 percent decrease.

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Home Buyer Tax Credit Could Expand

A first-time home buyer tax credit of up to $8,000 has helped to move housing inventory during an otherwise sluggish real estate cycle. Now both legislators and the business community are hoping to build on the incentive's success by expanding it. A number of bills have been introduced in the House and the Senate that lobby for an expansion of the measure. Among the proposed changes:

* Setting a new cap of $15,000.

* Extending the tax break into mid-2010.

* Making the benefit available to all home buyers, not just first-timers.

* Offering a separate tax credit to $3,000 for borrowers who refinance.

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Fannie Mae Continues Tightening Lending Rules

Reversing a long-standing policy, Fannie no longer will permit mortgage applicants to count the income of so-called "trailing spouses" toward the household income needed to qualify for a loan. A trailing spouse is one who joins his or her spouse or partner in a job-related move, but who has yet to obtain employment in the new location. As part of its June 8 tightening of underwriting rules, Fannie Mae also announced that it plans to discount the values of all borrowers' stock, bond, mutual fund and retirement fund holdings that are claimed toward the applicants' financial reserves needed to qualify for a mortgage. While Fannie previously counted 100 percent of the claimed or documented value of stocks, bonds and mutual funds toward reserves, under its revised policy it will discount them by 30 percent. For retirement accounts, it will count only 60 percent of the value toward reserves. To illustrate: If your mutual funds and stocks are worth $100,000 according to your investment manager or broker, Fannie will credit only $70,000 toward reserves. If your retirement account is worth $500,000, Fannie will give you credit toward reserves of only $300,000.

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Million-dollar homes hard to move in down economy

Sales of million-dollar-plus homes in Hillsborough and Pinellas counties plunged 42 percent from 2006 to 2008, from 554 to 321. This year, million-dollar transactions are even harder to find. As of early June, the two counties had recorded about 70 sales in the million-plus category, the slowest pace in more than a decade. Sometimes the homes have sold, but price chopping knocked them out of the million-dollar club.

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Florida unemployment hit 10.2% in May as Tampa Bay's leapt to 10.6%

With nearly 140,000 people out of work in May, the Tampa Bay area's unemployment rate leapt to 10.6 percent. That was nearly a half-point rise over April's jobless rate of 10.2 and matched a similar rise across Florida and the United States. Just a year earlier, in May 2008, unemployment stood at 5.9 percent. But the recession that began with the housing slump has been extending into formerly healthy industries like engineering, publishing and financial services. Florida's jobless totaled 10.2 percent last month, the highest rate since October 1975 when it was 11 percent. The national unemployment rate was 9.4 percent in May, up from April's 8.9 percent.

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Low Inflation Rate Drives Latest Mortgage Rates Down

The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage (FRM) averaged 5.38 percent with an average 0.7 point for the week ending June 18, 2009, down from last week when it averaged 5.59 percent. Last year at this time, the 30-year FRM averaged 6.42 percent.

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Brookings Institute Ranks Tampa In Last Economic Tier

Tampa comes out near the bottom in a survey that ranks the largest 100 metro areas in groups of 20 by indicators including economic output, unemployment and housing. The Brookings Institution rates the Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater area in the "weakest 20." The region's rankings included:

•21st highest unemployment rate at 10.4 percent;

•92nd in growth in "gross metropolitan product," which has fallen 5.5 percent from its peak through the first quarter of 2009; gross metropolitan product is the value of all the goods and services produced in a metropolitan area over a year's time;

•87th place in housing price change, with real housing prices down 13.2 percent from the fourth quarter of 2008 through the first quarter of this year.

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Depression Killing Downtown Tampa Condo Plans

In yet another sign that wanting the depression to end doesn't necessarily make it so, plans have fallen through for a pair of 30-story condos or apartments on a Channel District waterfront site. For downtown Tampa, the end of the project adds to the half-dozen planned condominium and apartment projects that failed to materialize since the housing market collapsed in the past three years. The fact the deal didn't happen shows that despite signs the depression could weaken by year's end, expectations of a recovery do not equate to a boom. Financing for new development remains tight, even for respected investors. Some condominium units that once sold for $400,000 are now being sold for half that, people are renting apartments rather than buying homes or condos, and speculators who helped drive prices skyward and fueled a local building boom have long retreated from view. The Channel District condos were to have been built by Clearwater developer Byrd Corp. on 3.5 acres owned by the Port of Tampa. Instead, for now, the site will remain a valet parking lot.

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May U.S. housing construction jumps by 17.2 percent

Construction of new U.S. homes has jumped in May by the largest amount in three months, providing an encouraging sign that the nation’s deep housing recession was beginning to bottom out. The Commerce Department says that construction of new homes and apartments jumped 17.2 percent last month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 532,000 units. That was better than the 500,000-unit pace that economists had expected and came after construction had fallen in April to a record low of 454,000 units. In another encouraging sign, applications for building permits, seen as a good indicator of future activity, rose by 4 percent in May to an annual rate of 518,000 units.

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Neighbors are forcing neighbors into foreclosure

Thousands of Americans who have generally kept up with their mortgages are still in danger of losing their homes because they made a fateful trade-off in this shaky economy — they let their homeowner association dues slide. Many homeowners are learning to their surprise that condo and neighborhood associations that oversee security patrols, mow lawns, plant flowers and clean the community swimming pool may have the right to foreclose when dues aren't paid. That right is often written into the purchase agreement signed by the homeowner.

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Rising Interest Rates Dampen Housing Recovery

Rising interest rates are bad news for the housing market, analysts say. "Mortgage rates at these levels will hobble the [housing] recovery, and it was just the beginning of the recovery," says Kenneth Rosen, chairman of the Fisher Center for Real Estate and Urban Economics at the University of California, Berkeley. The Federal Reserve stepped in mid-week to buy Treasurys and announced it will buy more next week, but that didn’t seem to do much to lower rates. Meanwhile, the Obama Administration’s plan to assist home owners current on payments but lacking enough equity to refinance appears to be failing – only a few hundred people have been able to take advantage of the program. Analysts say slow-moving lenders, low appraisals, low credit scores and second mortgages all reduce the likelihood that a borrower in good standing will be able to refinance.

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Home short sale flips nixed

It may be a bit tougher now for investors to flip short sales for big profits. Attorneys' Title Insurance Fund notified its 6,000 member lawyers this week that it will not insure deals made with a popular - but controversial - method for closing flips of short sales. A short sale occurs when a mortgage holder agrees to allow a home to sell for less than the mortgage balance so that foreclosure can be avoided. The Orlando-based fund is a major underwriter for lawyers who write title insurance in Florida. In a letter to lawyers, the fund said it has become aware of short sale programs advertised on the Internet that promise to make investors lots of money with little or no work. The letter says they involve investors entering option deals with homeowners for "the exclusive right to purchase their property for a period of time." The investor negotiates a short sale with the mortgage holder by convincing it that the price it is offering is the market value of the property. The investor then finds a buyer for a much higher price. The sales happen simultaneously, and the investor pockets the difference. The problem is that "the original lender is not told that the buyer is flipping the property on the same day for thousands more than the lender has been told is the market value of the property," the letter states.

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Mortgage Rates Climb To Highest Level In Seven Months

The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage (FRM) averaged 5.59 percent with an average 0.7 point for the week ending June 11, 2009, up from last week when it averaged 5.29 percent. Last year at this time, the 30-year FRM averaged 6.32 percent. The last time the 30-year FRM was higher was the week ending November 26, 2008, when it averaged 5.97 percent.

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Tampa area foreclosure rate continues to climb

The weak economy continues to fortify housing foreclosures in the Tampa Bay area. Foreclosure filings in May rose 33 percent year over year in Pinellas, Pasco, Hillsborough and Hernando counties, the firm RealtyTrac said. About 6,841 properties received foreclosure notices in May versus 5,151 a year earlier. Among the biggest foreclosure states, Florida, with 58,931 filings, came in second behind California. The Tampa Bay area's foreclosure rate was 1 out of every 192 households, lower than the state's rate of 1 out of every 148 households. Foreclosures were up slightly in May over April. County-by-county foreclosure totals were 2,458 in Pinellas, 1,500 in Pasco, 2,408 in Hillsborough and 475 in Hernando. The numbers don't necessarily mean the homes were repossessed. In most cases, homeowners received notice that banks were starting foreclosure proceedings. The process often takes up to a year.

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US May foreclosures third highest on record

U.S. foreclosure activity for May ebbed from April's record, but mortgages still failed at a staggering pace as President Barack Obama's rescue programs had not had time to fully take root, RealtyTrac said on Thursday. Foreclosure filings dipped 6 percent in the month but increased 18 percent from May 2008, marking the third highest month on record.

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4 Florida counties see home prices plunge

Four Florida counties are among the nation's hardest-hit by home price declines, but there are signs that the free-falling prices are starting to flatten, according to a report released this morning by Integrated Asset Services, which tracks home valuations for banks, investors and hedge funds. Hernando and Pasco counties saw drops of 43 percent and 56 percent, respectively, since prices peaked in July 2006, the report states. Two other Florida counties were named among the 10 counties with the steepest drops. Charlotte and Lee counties had price drops of 43 percent and 53 percent, respectively.

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Shiller Believes Home Prices Will Drop for Years

U.S. housing prices could continue to fall for years, says Robert J. Shiller, the Yale University finance professor who helped devise the home-price index that bears his name. Shiller wrote in a column in The New York Times that declines in home prices don’t right themselves quickly. As an example, he pointed to the Japanese economy where land prices fell for 15 years after the 1980 housing bubble burst. Shiller’s article commented on an estimate by T2 Partners LLC, a hedge fund, that home prices will likely hit bottom in mid-2010 after dropping 40 percent to 50 percent from their high.

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Chinese Drywall Found In River Walk Community

River Walk isn't alone. As many as 100,000 homes nationwide have the drywall, some experts estimate, and Florida appears to be at the epicenter of the growing problem. The Florida Department of Health has received nearly 400 complaints from homeowners and several federal agencies, including the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, are investigating. Of the 365 complaints the commission has logged, most have come from Florida, according to its Web site. Dozens of builders used the drywall, mainly from 2004 through 2007. Homeowners have complained of sore throats, dry eyes, nosebleeds and dizziness. Some say they have been advised by their doctors to move out of their homes. Columbus, Ohio-based MI Homes, which built River Walk, is offering to relocate residents and replace all infected drywall and appliances, said Marshall Gray, area president of the Tampa division of MI Homes.

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Too Early to Call Housing Bottom

Housing research organization IHS Global Insight estimates that the average U.S. home is undervalued by 12.2 percent, and many previously pricey communities are undervalued by considerably more. A recent study released by IHS used home prices, interest rates, area incomes, population density, and historic premiums and discounts to analyze housing values. It examined 330 markets and found homes are underpriced in 248 of them. Despite the high percentage of undervalued areas, IHS says "it is too early to call a bottoming," as "job losses continue, housing inventories remain elevated, and consumers remain wary in light of economic uncertainty."

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Chlorine Dioxide Tested As Cure For Chinese Sheetrock

One company says they may be able to fix the Chinese drywall problem without tearing up homes. Grosse Pointe Developers and BBL Builders teamed up with Sabre, a company specializing in cleaning contaminated buildings. Workers will fumigate a duplex in the Bell Tower Park Community with Chlorine Dioxide, which is supposed to neutralize sulfur gasses associated with Chinese drywall. The treatment takes about eight hours. Scientists on site hope it will stop issues like corrosion of metal fixtures and health problems.

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New homebuyer will need down payment despite $8,000 tax credit

The Obama administration has put out the official word: Starting soon, first-time homebuyers nationwide will be able to turn their $8,000 federal tax credits into cash for use at closing if they use Federal Housing Administration mortgage financing. But in its final guidelines to lenders and homebuyers issued May 29, the Department of Housing and Urban Development clarified that purchasers obtaining FHA loans through private lenders will have to invest at least some of their own funds in the form of a minimum 3.5 percent down payment. In other words, you'll need equity in the house to participate. This won't be a zero-down plan, with one exception: If you obtain your FHA loan through one of the state housing agency "tax credit monetization" programs, you'll be allowed to pay for your entire down payment with the help of a bridge loan provided by the agency. Those bridge loans generally are low-interest or no-interest short-term second liens secured by the property, and convert into second mortgages if they are not paid off with the proceeds of the tax credit.

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Florida real estate crash means Tampa Bay homes are too cheap, report says

According to IHS Global Insight, a economic forecasting company based in Lexington, Mass., our real estate is undervalued. IHS took a measure of our depreciated home prices, population density, household income and historical attractiveness and insists our median home price of about $131,000 is 16.9 percent too low. Three years ago, when a typical home sold for $186,400, IHS deemed us 30 percent overvalued. Florida's most stressed real estate region, Cape Coral-Fort Myers, was among the 10 most undervalued among 330 markets examined by IHS. Overvaluation remains a problem in places like the Pacific Northwest, south New Jersey and North Carolina.

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Mortgage Rates Climb In Response To Recent Increases In Bond Yields

The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage (FRM) averaged 5.29 percent with an average 0.7 point for the week ending June 4, 2009, up from last week when it averaged 4.91 percent. Last year at this time, the 30-year FRM averaged 6.09 percent.

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Florida's foreclosed homes might be use as storm shelters

The state's top disaster-management official has a use for all those foreclosed homes in Florida: temporary hurricane housing. The drill's scenario: a Category 4 storm nearly bankrupts the state, displaces one million residents, destroys homes and schools, and even frees zoo monkeys that terrorize Floridians. During the weeklong exercise, Almaguer said, it didn't take long for the 250 state, federal and local officials to figure out that neither Florida nor FEMA has enough shelter space to house the newly homeless. Florida has about 250,000 homes in the process of foreclosure and up to 300,000 unsold homes on the market. Using the foreclosed homes is just another example of utilizing whatever shelter is available, said Almaguer. Six years ago, he noted, the notion of using cruise ships as shelter space seemed out of the question but now it's a recognized option.

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Governor vetoes FAR-supported condo bill

Few Realtor-supported bills fell victim to Gov. Charlie Crist’s veto pen this session, save one. Late yesterday, the governor vetoed a condominium insurance bill sponsored by Sen. Dennis Jones (D-Seminole). In his veto letter, the governor said he supports provisions of SB 714 that repealed the requirement for mandatory property insurance coverage on individual units. But he disliked a provision that delays retrofit requirements for certain sprinkler systems used for common areas from 2014 to 2025. “I am sensitive to the costs associated with installing fire sprinkler systems, especially in these challenging times,” the governor wrote. “[But] this delay presents an unacceptable safety risk, especially to Florida’s elderly condominium residents.” The governor has directed the Department of Business and Professional Regulation to study the cost and impact of retrofits on insurance premiums, and recommend solutions to the 2010 Legislature.

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US pending home sales rise 6.7 percent in April

The number of U.S. homebuyers who agreed to purchase a previously occupied home in April posted the largest monthly jump in nearly eight years, a sign that sales are finally coming to life after a long and painful slump. The National Association of Realtors said Tuesday its seasonally adjusted index of sales contracts signed in April surged 6.7 percent to 90.3, far exceeding analysts' forecasts. It was the biggest monthly jump since October 2001, when pending sales rose 9.2 percent. Completed home sales rose 2.9 percent to an annual rate of 4.68 million in April from a downwardly revised pace of 4.55 million in March, the Realtors' group said last week. Sales of inexpensive foreclosures and other distressed low-end properties have even sparked bidding wars in places like Las Vegas, Phoenix and Miami. But the market for high-end properties remains at a virtual standstill.

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HUD: Tax Credit Can Be Used on Closing Costs

FHA-approved lenders received the go-ahead to develop bridge-loan products that enable first-time buyers to use the benefits of the federal tax credit upfront, according to eagerly awaited guidance from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development on so-called home buyer tax credit loans that was released today. Under the guidance, FHA-approved lenders can develop bridge loans that home buyers can use to help cover their closing costs, buy down their interest rate, or put down more than the minimum 3.5 percent. The loans can't be used to cover the minimum 3.5 percent, senior HUD officials told reporters on a conference call Friday morning. Thus, buyers applying for FHA-backed financing with an FHA-approved lender that offers a bridge-loan program can get a bridge loan to bring down the upfront costs of buying a home significantly but would still have to come up with the minimum 3.5 percent downpayment.

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Hurricane watchers to emphasize storm surge danger

The experience of Hurricane Ike in Texas last year has prompted the National Hurricane Center to put more emphasis on storm surge this hurricane season, which starts today and ends Nov. 30. Too many people in Texas didn't realize how deadly and destructive storm surge could be. The same scenario could easily happen in the Tampa Bay area. In fact, it could be worse.

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