Housing markets

Many El Paso, Texas, homebuilders are opening model homes only for appointments, or in other ways limiting access to the homes, which for years have been their best selling tool. Home construction continues.

New-home construction declined in March from the previous month by the most since 1984 as the pandemic started to take a bigger toll on the housing market and broader economy.

From the crossroads of America down to the bayou, here's a look at 12 housing markets where it's the most financially prudent to buy a home rather than rent, according to First American.

In the Philadelphia metropolitan area, new listings are down almost 43% from March 1 to April 5, when the number of new listings typically grows by roughly 52%, according to Zillow.

Homebuilder sentiment plunged in April to the lowest level in more than seven years as the coronavirus pandemic kept potential buyers quarantined and paralyzed construction in much of the country.

Home sales and prices in San Antonio kept rising in March, but a slowdown caused by the coronavirus pandemic may lie ahead.

While home showings in the Twin Cities have plummeted in recent weeks and sales of upper-bracket houses are sputtering, first-time buyers are still in the market.

Purchase originations will recover somewhat in the third and fourth quarters as home sales pick up.

The coronavirus has started to take a toll on the Treasure Valley's still-hot housing market, but you wouldn't know it from the latest home-price data.

Even before the onset of the COVID-19 crisis, the number of single-family homes on the market in Santa Fe County, N.M., was the lowest it's been since officials began keeping such data in 2005.

North Texas housing starts and new home sales surged in the first quarter, but most of those gains came before the COVID-19 pandemic shut down the area's economy.

The Rhode Island Association of Realtors reports that single-family home sales in the state actually rose slightly year-after-year in March, despite the onset of the coronavirus crisis.

Demand for housing has recently waned in many parts of the country amid the COVID-19 pandemic, but that trend has largely not been the case in Cheyenne, Wyo.

The Flagstaff, Ariz., housing market has consistently seen high prices for single-family homes over the years, and the coronavirus didn't stop the median price of a home from rising 6%.

Even the spread of a pandemic failed to cool off Albuquerque's home price growth in March.

North Texas home sales and prices continued to rise in March from a year earlier, but last month's home sales snapshot mostly reflects contracts signed in January and February, before the pandemic hit.

Homebuilders in the Twin Cities kept the construction spigot open during March amid growing concerns about the COVID-19 pandemic.

Demand for San Diego County homes has waned in recent weeks as the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic ripples through the real estate industry.

With the onset of the pandemic, real estate agents say deals that were in the works are encountering all types of problems, creating havoc in the market as buyers try to back out of contracts.

Social distancing, stay-home orders and a worsening economic crisis are upending Houston's housing market.