Housing markets

Purchases of new single-family homes increased 8% to a 664,000 annual pace last month, after an upward revision to November's figure, government data showed Thursday.

While becoming more popular in the past year as mortgage rates have increased, the differential is small between those that did and didn't pay points for a permanent buydown, Freddie Mac said.

The real estate markets where prices are expected to rise the most this year will see an average increase of 5.14%.

Though the rate of growth for these conversions has slowed due to higher financing costs and long lead times associated with zoning and permitting, the trend is here to stay.

The number of homeowners spending more than 30% of income on housing costs jumped 18% from pre-pandemic 2019, according to a new Harvard analysis.

With many already living in aging properties, the millennial generation could be stuck with the costs, a Leaf Home/Morning Consult survey claimed.

Timothy Harleth is launching Generational Equity Labs, a fund that plans to use a technology platform linking would-be homebuyers to institutions to support equity sharing.

Bidding wars are also coming back into play in several markets across the country, with the Northeast, in particular, seeing increased activity, according to Redfin.

Contract closings decreased 1% from a month earlier to a 3.78 million annualized rate, according to National Association of Realtors data released Friday.

Sekisui House Ltd. announced a $4.9 billion agreement on Thursday to buy MDC Holdings Inc., ikely the biggest U.S. purchase of a homebuilder by a Japanese company.