Market Studies

Year-over-year home price gains in March landed in double-digit territory, according to CoreLogic's Home Price Index (HPI) report. Home prices-when including distressed sales--rose by 10.5 percent in March compared to the year before, marking the biggest annual gain since March 2006, the data provider reported. CoreLogic's pending HPI projects prices in April will show a 9.6 percent annual gain and rise by 1.3 percent month-over-month.

Hiring fell 4.3 percent in March, the same month in which payroll job growth plunged, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported Tuesday in its monthly Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS). Data from the report indicated there were 11.2 unemployed construction workers for every available job in March, up from 9.0 in February. By industry, the number of unemployed persons per job opening also increased in the manufacturing and information sectors.

The percentage of banks reporting stronger demand for mortgage loans rose in the second quarter, the Federal Reserve reported Monday, with more banks easing lending standards. Those results, revealed in the Fed's Senior Loan Officers Opinion Survey, are consistent with reports that mortgage loans are becoming easier to obtain. While the results suggest a trend in lending standards, they could be misleading: A bank which has tightened standards as much as possible may not necessarily ease them.

According to NAHB, the number of housing markets showing ""sustained improvement"" fell to 258 from April's 273. The index, put together by NAHB and First American Title, tracks housing permits, employment, and home prices in markets across the country. ""While seasonal trends in home prices resulted in an overall decline in the IMI this month, the index remains at a very strong level and continues to represent markets in every state,"" remarked NAHB chief economist David Crowe.

As home sales and home prices in the Miami metro area continue to post gains, absentee buyers and cash purchases make up a sizable portion of the market, according to San Francisco-based DataQuick's March report. March was the 11th consecutive month of annual home sale gains in Miami and the 15th consecutive month of annual median price increases in the metro.

The rate of new loans that rolled into serious delinquency fell below 1 percent for the first time since 2007, Lender Processing Services (LPS) reported Monday. The new problem loan rate--defined as seriously delinquent mortgages that were current six months ago--inched down toward pre-crisis levels to 0.84 percent in March. The new problem loan rate averaged 0.55 percent from 2000 to 2004. As expected, when categorizing borrowers by equity position, LPS found borrowers with higher levels of negative equity tended to have higher new problem loan rates.

Imagine if someone removed the speedometer from your car and then put limits on how fast or slow you could drive. That's what 11 House members are doing with legislation which would prohibit the Census Bureau from any data collection except for the decennial headcount of Americans. The impact of the bill HR 1638 would be to eviscerate and effectively eliminate the monthly employment situation report that produces, among other things, the unemployment rate as well as a host of other bits of data about the economy. The sponsors of the bill must believe that if we don't count unemployment it won't exist.

In a recent report, Radar Logic closely examined purchase trends and patterns from institutional investors in the Atlanta area. Among its findings, the research firm found investors have been targeting a different cross-section of homes compared to traditional buyers. According to the report, institutional investors are more likely to purchase homes that are cheaper, smaller, and located in lower-income areas compared to homes bought by non-investor buyers.

With the homeownership rate already at its lowest point since 1995, Capital Economics predicts further decline before a rebound occurs. The analytics firm predicted last July that the homeownership rate would fall to a low of 64 percent, and the firm is sticking to that forecast. The firm suggests the 64 percent low will come sometime ""within a year or so,"" and when it does, the market will have about 9 million more renters when the homeownership rate peaked. One of the major contributors to the ongoing decline in homeownership is the high level of foreclosures that continues to challenge the market.

The economy added 165,000 jobs in April--rebounding from a weak report for March--and the unemployment rate dropped to 7.5.percent, its lowest level since December 2008, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday. Economists had forecast payrolls would grow by 153,000, and that the unemployment rate would remain at 7.6 percent. Payroll growth for March, originally reported at 88,000, was revised upward to 138,000, and February was revised to 332,000 from 268,000.