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Cost Gap Returns to Historical Norms in Some Markets as House Prices Drop…
Below, find a link to a great article from today’s WSJ. It states that the relative cost of owning versus renting is swinging back in favor of home ownership in some U.S. markets.
“After two years of rapid home-price depreciation, the relationship between the cost of rental payments versus after-tax mortgage payments is tilting toward ownership in a number of metropolitan areas.”
click here for the entire article :
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123552129423664663.html
Have we hit the bottom? Some are saying the housing market is stabilizing. I see a lot of buyers still buying. and I see houses still entering the market.
There is definitely movement out there. There are inquiries on my listings and I have buyers that are approved for a mortgage. Lack of Money to lend: This seems to be the fallacy on the street. People can still borrow money. There are loans to be had.
but understand: WE ARE BACK TO RESPONSIBLE BORROWING
Perhaps the banks are a bit extreme in the requirements to borrow but this will eventually ease up…
Created 2009-01-14 09: Inman_News
Applications for refinance loans jumped 25.6 percent for the week ending Jan. 9 as borrowers sought to take advantage of a continued free-fall in fixed-rate mortgage rates for borrowers with good credit.
Applications for purchase loans fell 14.1 percent, and refinance applications accounted for 85.3 percent of all mortgage applications, the Mortgage Bankers Association said in releasing a weekly survey [1] of lenders.
Applications for adjustable-rate mortgages accounted for 1.1 percent of activity, up from 0.9 percent the previous week, with ARM loans offering little or no savings over fixed-rate loans.
Freddie Mac, in its weekly survey [2] of mortgage rates, said interest rates last week on 30-year fixed-rate conforming loans fell for the tenth week in a row, to a new low.
For the week ending Jan. 8, 30-year fixed-rate mortgages averaged 5.01 percent with an average 0.6 point, down from 5.1 percent a week ago and 5.87 percent a year ago. Freddie Mac has never seen lower rates since the survey began in 1971.
Since the end of October, rates on 30-year fixed-rate mortgages have declined by almost 1.5 percent, which translates into a savings of about $184 a month on a $200,000 loan, said Freddie Mac vice president and chief economist Frank Nothaft.
Nothaft noted that the Federal Reserve announced on Nov. 25 that it planned to purchase up to $500 billion of mortgage-backed securities issued by Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae and Ginnie Mae (see story [3]). By way of comparison, Nothaft noted that there were $4.7 trillion in such securities available at the end of September.
The 15-year FRM last week averaged 4.62 percent with an average 0.7 point, down from 4.83 percent the week before and 5.43 percent a year ago. The 15-year FRM has not been lower since June 13, 2003, when it averaged 4.60 percent.
Five-year Treasury-indexed hybrid adjustable-rate mortgages (ARMs) averaged 5.49 percent last week, with an average 0.7 point, down from 5.57 percent the previous week and 5.63 percent a year ago.
One-year Treasury-indexed ARMs averaged 4.95 percent this week with an average 0.5 point, up from 4.85 percent the previous week and 5.37 percent a year ago.
Arial Shot of The Train Station in Huntington
ahh, the 50’s on Long Island… I got this photograph from a gentleman that lives across the street from one of my listings in “the village”. He pointed out where his barber shop was in the photo and told me “…business was great, until the Beatles came on the scene.”
