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NEW YORK CITY (New York Times) – New single-family homes sold at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 300,000 in May, down 32.7 percent from the April rate of 446,000, according to the latest government figures. The May sales rate is 18.3 percent below that of May 2009 when the rate was 367,000. These numbers surpassed the 23.8 percent decline in January 1994, making the current decrease a record low.
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TEXAS (PRNewswire) – The Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs (TDHCA) allocated Enterprise Community Partners Inc. $5.7 million in Neighborhood Stabilization Program (NSP) funding to provide down payment and closing cost assistance, gap financing, and a zero percent mortgage for potential homebuyers interested in single-family homes in the North Texas area. Texas NSP is focusing on 13 cities: Cedar Hill, DeSoto, Duncanville, Lancaster, Midlothian, Waxahachie, Granbury, Greenville, Cleburne, Forney, Corsicana, Weatherford and Rockwall. Qualifying families must earn 80 percent or less of the area median family income, which is approximately $55,000 for a family of four, and are eligible to receive up to $30,000 each. The funding is available on a first-come, first-served basis.
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DALLAS (Dallas Business Journal) – Texas has the 12th-lowest home-care costs and other long-term care services in the country, according to Genworth’s 2010 Cost of Care Survey. The median annual rate for home care costs statewide is $41,070, 6 percent lower than the national average of $43,472. Annual nursing home private rooms cost, on average, $58,765 in Texas, compared with $75,190 nationally. These rates represent an increase of 3 percent in Texas over the past five years and 5 percent nationally. The study reported that annual costs for assisted-living care in one-bedroom, single-occupancy units in Texas have increased 5 percent over the past five years, compared with 7 percent nationally. A previous Genworth report found that 78 percent of Texans prefer home care for long-term care, while 18 percent chose assisted living and 2 percent chose a nursing home.
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SAN FRANCISCO (RealtyTrac) – The four major Texas metros had increases in residential foreclosures in the first quarter of this year, according to RealtyTrac statistics released yesterday. Austin–Round Rock fared best, although foreclosure filings increased to 2,908 properties and 0.44 percent of the area’s total housing units. Filings increased 20.51 percent from fourth quarter 2009 and 27.26 percent from first quarter 2009. In Dallas–Fort Worth–Arlington, foreclosures were filed for 13,637 properties, 0.57 percent of the area’s housing units. This was a 28.3 percent increase in filings from the previous quarter and a 56.95 percent increase from first quarter 2009. Foreclosure filings in Houston–Sugar Land–Baytown totaled 11,223 last quarter, which represents 0.5 percent of its housing units. Filings were up 27.01 percent from fourth quarter 2009 and 63.2 percent from first quarter 2009. San Antonio foreclosure filings hit 3,569 for the first three months of 2010, representing 0.46 percent of the city’s housing units. The number of filings was 21.89 percent more than in fourth quarter 2009 and 25.23 percent more than in first quarter 2009.
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FORT WORTH (Fort Worth Star-Telegram) – For the second year in a row, Texas cities took half of the top ten spots in Newgeography.com's annual ranking of the best cities in the nation in which to find a job. Austin–Round Rock–San Marcos ranked first, San Antonio–New Braunfels second, Houston–Sugar Land–Baytown third, Dallas-Plano-Irving fifth and Fort Worth–Arlington seventh. Among the medium-sized cities that Newgeography.com ranked, El Paso was fifth, McAllen-Mission-Edinburg was sixth and Corpus Christi was seventh. College Station–Bryan was the third best smallest city in which to find a job. Killeen–Temple–Fort Hood was fourth. The rankings are based on three-month rolling averages of monthly employment data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics from November 1999 to January 2010.
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DALLAS (Dallas Morning News) – Sixty percent of Dallas County homeowners will see a decrease in their home values this year, according to the Dallas Central Appraisal District. Last year, that number was 55 percent. Values will increase for 20 percent of homeowners, and the remaining 20 percent will see no change. While this will mean lower taxes for many homeowners, it will also mean a reduction in property tax revenue for local governments. That's bad news for Dallas County, which is expecting a $56 million shortfall, and for the city of Dallas, which is anticipating nearly twice that. The appraisal district reappraised about 360,000 homes this year. The roughly 280,000 homes that were not reappraised this year also will not change in value.
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WASHINGTON (U.S. Census Bureau) – Parts of Texas have some of the lowest rates of mail participation so far in the 2010 Census, according to a report released today by the U.S. Census Bureau. Nationally, 46 percent of households have mailed back their forms. But in parts of Texas, the participation rate is significantly lower. Among those Texas cities with the lowest mail participation rates as of Monday, March 29, 2010, are: - Brownsville, 25 percent (Census 2000, 63 percent)
- Laredo, 27 percent (Census 2000, 63 percent)
- Austin, 33 percent (Census 2000, 68 percent)
- Houston, 33 percent (Census 2000, 64 percent)
- San Antonio, 37 percent (Census 2000, 72 percent)
“We’re concerned about the relatively low response from parts of Texas,” said Census Bureau Director Robert Groves. “Every household that fails to send back their census form by mail must be visited by a census taker starting in May — at a significant taxpayer cost. The easiest and best way to be counted in the census is to fill out and return your form by mail.” For every percentage point increase in mail response, taxpayers will save an estimated $85 million in federal funds. Those funds would otherwise be required to send census takers to collect census responses in person from households that don't mail back the form.
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COLLEGE STATION (Real Estate Center) – Both the U.S and the Texas labor markets hit bottom in August 2009 and since then have been losing jobs at decreasing rates. Texas’ job loss rate has decreased from 4 percent in August 2009 to 2.3 percent in February 2010. Over the same period, the U.S. job loss rate has decreased from 5 percent to 2.5 percent. The state’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate rose from 6.8 percent in February 2009 to 8.2 percent in February 2010, while the U.S. rate rose from 8.2 percent to 9.7 percent during the same period. Only one Texas industry, education and health services, and the government sector had more jobs in February 2010 than in February 2009. Ten other industries experienced net job losses over the same period. Four Texas metro areas had positive employment growth rates from February 2009 to February 2010. They were College Station–Bryan, Killeen–Temple–Fort Hood, Waco and McAllen-Edinburg-Mission. Twenty-two metro areas had net job losses.
The state’s actual unemployment rate in February 2010 was 8.3 percent. Amarillo had the lowest unemployment rate followed by Midland, College Station–Bryan and Lubbock. The Real Estate Center's complete monthly Texas economic review is available online.
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COLLEGE STATION (Real Estate Center) – Did you know that the 2010 Census plays a vital role in the amount of representation and federal funding Texas receives? Or that this year's form has been shortened and simplified? And did you know that the first U.S. Census was administered by... Well, we won't tell you. But you can learn everything you ever wanted to know about the 2010 Census on this week's Real Estate Red Zone podcast. Also, Bryan Pope talks with Real Estate Center Education Coordinator Denise Whisenant about her role with TREC's Education Working Group. In “Small Towns, Big Deals,” Edie Craig shares the biggest real estate stories from towns we haven't covered before, including Terrell, Newark and Willis. You can listen to the free podcast from your computer by going to recenter.tamu.edu/podcast and clicking the “play” button beneath each episode. To subscribe, click on the RSS feed found on the podcast page. You can also subscribe through iTunes and download each episode to your iPod.
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DALLAS (Dallas Morning News) – A deck park over Woodall Rogers Frwy. will bring more than five acres of green space to downtown Dallas’ arts district in early 2012. The Woodall Rodgers Park, which will extend three blocks from St. Paul to Pearl Street, will have a performance pavilion, a restaurant, walking trails, a dog park, a children's discovery garden and playground, water features and an area for games. The park was designed by landscape architect and designer Jim Burnett of Houston and Dan Biederman of New York. The Woodall Rodgers Park Foundation needs to raise $27 million to meet the $110 million cost of the park.
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TEXAS (Real Estate Center, Reuters, CNNMoney.com) – A total of 13,064 existing single-family homes were sold in Texas last month, a 2 percent drop from February 2009, according to MLS data compiled by the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University. The median price was up 2 percent to $141,100 during the same period, and the state finished the month with a 6.9-month inventory of existing homes. Here is how select Texas cities fared in February (data current as of March 25, 2010): | | Sales | Change from
Last Year | Median
Price | Change from
Last Year | Months'
Inventory | | Austin | 1,276 | up 7% | $182,000 | down 3% | 6.2 | | Dallas | 2,707 | down 9% | $149,200 | up 1% | 6.1 | | Fort Bend | 510 | down 7% | $188,700 | up 8% | 4.8 | | Fort Worth | 538 | up 5% | $106,000 | down 3% | 6.5 | | Houston | 3,615 | down 4% | $146,600 | up 6% | 6.6 | | Longview-Marshall | 116 | down 12% | $120,000 | up 1% | 8.9 | | Odessa | 67 | up 26% | $123,100 | down 5% | 5.8 | | San Antonio | 1,239 | up 7% | $140,700 | down 1% | 7.8 | | Temple-Belton | 94 | down 10% | $110,800 | down 11% | 6.7 | | Victoria | 61 | up 33% | $109,200 | down 23% | 6.6 | | Texas | 13,064 | down 2% | $141,100 | up 2% | 6.9 |
Additional home sales data for these and other major Texas cities are available on the Center's website. At the national level, the National Association of Realtors reported this week that existing-home sales fell 0.6 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.02 million units in February from 5.05 million in January. That was 7 percent higher than the 4.69 million-unit pace from February 2009. Total housing inventory at the end of February rose 9.5 percent to 3.59 million existing homes, representing an 8.6-month supply. The national median existing-home price for all housing types of $165,100 last month, which was 1.8 percent below February 2009.
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DALLAS (Dallas Business Journal) – The Bridge Homeless Assistance Center has received LEED Silver certification from the U.S. Green Building Council. The homeless shelter, in Dallas’ central business district, is one of only two in the nation with such recognition and one of only five considered green. The 2008 building is designed to maximize daylight, reduce the use of artificial light and conserve 1.5 million gallons of water each year by using the graywater recycling system. The Bridge Homeless Assistance Center was designed by San Antonio–based Overland Partners Architects and Dallas-based CamargoCopeland Architects.
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SAN ANTONIO (San Antonio Express-News) – State Farm will raise its home insurance rates 4.5 percent statewide beginning in May. New customers will pay the increased rates in May. The rates will be applied to renewed policies beginning June 1. The increase comes after the insurance company raised its rates 8.8 percent in October. With increased rates come increased discounts. State Farm will raise its discount for consumers who buy both home insurance and auto policies from 15 percent to 20 percent. State Farm is Texas’ largest home insurer, holding nearly 30 percent of the homeowner insurance market statewide. Travelers Insurance will also boost home insurance rates across Texas an average of 6.9 percent beginning Apr. 17.
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TEXAS (Real Estate Center, Reuters, CNNMoney.com) – A total of 10,217 existing single-family homes were sold in Texas last month, a 5 percent drop from January 2009, according to MLS data compiled by the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University. The median price was up 4 percent to $137,100 during the same period, and the state finished the month with a 6.5-month inventory of existing homes. Here is how select Texas cities fared in January (data current as of Feb. 25, 2010): | | Sales | Change from
Last Year | Median
Price | Change from
Last Year | Months'
Inventory | | Amarillo | 107 | down 29% | $131,200 | up 3% | 5.7 | | Austin | 1,008 | up 10% | $174,800 | down 1% | 5.7 | | Dallas | 2,126 | down 9% | $141,000 | up 2% | 5.8 | | El Paso | 253 | down 17% | $130,700 | up 3% | 7.5 | | Fort Worth | 444 | down 4% | $102,700 | down 1% | 6.4 | | Houston | 2,788 | down 10% | $142,900 | up 9% | 6.3 | | Laredo | 55 | down 4% | $108,800 | down 1% | 9 | | Lubbock | 139 | up 4% | $108,100 | no change | 5.3 | | McAllen | 137 | up 5% | $93,800 | up 3% | 13.5 | | San Antonio | 865 | up 1% | $139,000 | down 5% | 7.5 | | Texas | 10,217 | down 5% | $137,100 | up 4% | 6.5 |
Additional home sales data for these and other major Texas cities are available on the Center's website. At the national level, the National Association of Realtors reported this week that single-family home sales fell 7.2 percent to an annual rate of 5.05 million in January from a pace of 5.44 million in December. That was 11.5 percent above the January 2009 pace. Meanwhile, new home sales also fell at the national level. The seasonally adjusted annual rate of new home sales plummeted 11.2 percent to 309,000 last month, compared with a revised rate of 348,000 in December. According to Census Bureau data, that's a 6.1 percent decline from January 2009.
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DALLAS (Dallas Business Journal) – By the end of 2009, 10.3 percent of Texas home loans were delinquent — up 0.5 percent from the third quarter — but the number of loans 30-60 days delinquent fell 11 basis points to 4.43 percent, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association. A loan is considered delinquent if one or more payments are past due. Nationally, the delinquency rate declined 17 basis points to 9.47 percent, and the rate for loans 30-60 days delinquent fell 46 basis points to 3.36 percent. “This shows a significantly improved housing market, even from 90 days ago,” said Scott Norman, vice president of the Texas Mortgage Bankers Association. The year concluded with 2 percent of Texas home loans in foreclosure, compared with 4.58 percent nationwide.
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