Tag Archives: Cash Buyers

According to the latest Campbell/Inside Mortgage Finance HousingPulse Tracking Survey, an estimated 26.2 percent of home purchases by current homeowners in March relied solely on cash, up from a 12-month low of 22.8 percent recorded last August. Figures are based on a three-month moving average.

Both large institutional and smaller ""mom and pop"" investors have been very active purchasing homes at a steep discount, primarily in housing-bust markets. Industry reports attribute anywhere from 33 to 49 percent of September's home purchases to investors. Whether one-third or nearly one-half of the market, investors are the key force driving home prices, which could signal volatility in coming quarters.

Since 2011, investors have purchased more than 950,000 homes; and with 370,000 purchases so far this year, they have already surpassed the number of purchases they made in either of the past two years, according to a new report from RealtyTrac. In total, investors have spent $1 trillion acquiring single-family residences since 2011.

While higher mortgage rates have been blamed for the slowdown in pending home sales, they may be contributing to an increase in cash purchases, RealtyTrac suggested in a recent report. In July, about 40 percent of residential property sales were all-cash transactions. The share presents an increase from 35 percent in June and 31 percent compared to July 2012. Short sales also accounted for a bigger share of sales in July, increasing to 14 percent, up from 13 percent in the prior month and 9 percent from a year ago.

Home prices in the Las Vegas area soared to the highest point in nearly five years while cash sales also reached record levels, according to DataQuick. New and existing homes and condos in Clark County sold for a median price of $169,100 in June, representing an increase of 3.7 percent from May and a 35.3 percent jump from a year ago. Despite the significant improvement, Las Vegas still has a long way from to go when compared to its November 2006 peak of $312,000.

If it wasn't for cash sales during the housing downturn, sales today would look much weaker, and the dramatic price declines over the past few years would have been even steeper, CoreLogic reported Tuesday. From 2000 to 2005, cash sales remained steady, representing around 25 percent of all sales. When the real estate market crashed in 2007 and 2008, the share of cash sales, driven by the rise in REO sales, jumped and eventually peaked above 40 percent two years ago. For 19 straight months now, cash sales have been declining.

Existing-home sales rose a solid 4.2 percent in May to an annual sales rate of 5.18 million, the highest level since November 2009, the National Association of Realtors reported Thursday. Economists had expected existing-home sales to hit 5.0 million. The median price of an existing home jumped $16,200 (8.4 percent) for the month and was up $27,700 (15.4 percent) from May 2012. The inventory of homes for sale rose to 2.22 million from 2.15 million in April.

Existing-home sales rose 0.6 percent in April to an annual sales rate of 4.97 million, the highest level since November 2009, the National Association of Realtors reported Wednesday. The median price of an existing single-family home jumped $8,900 in the month to $192,800, the highest since August 2008. The inventory of homes for sale rose to 2.16 million--its highest level since last September. The supply of homes for sale rose to 5.2 months, the highest since October. Inventory has been a persistent concern to NAR, which says the low supply of homes for sale has reduced the number of transactions.

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.