Consumer

In Tennessee’s fastest-growing county, the gap between what people earn and what homes cost has widened so far that one local official calls it a direct threat to generational wealth. Median family income in Rutherford County has risen 71 percent since 2005. Over the same period, median home prices have risen 213 percent. The math ...

In a market where buyers finally have leverage – where inventory is at roughly 10-year highs, sellers are cutting prices, and concessions are available – a surprising number of Houston home purchases are falling apart before the buyer even asks for a single repair. The problem isn’t structural defects in the homes, according to Sherry ...

The New Jersey housing market looks red-hot or cooling fast depending entirely on which slice you’re looking at – and sellers who confuse one segment’s strength for their own risk a costly mispricing. Along the coast in mid-2026, the gap between the luxury second-home market and the broader residential market serving primary-residence buyers is widening ...

Mortgage rates above six percent have buyers waiting on the sideline, but the wait itself may be the most expensive decision they make. According to Marty Medve, Co-Owner & Principal Broker at Trident Home Loans, the pattern has repeated across three rate cycles over 25 years: when rates drop even modestly, pent-up demand floods the ...

When most people think about insuring a home near the coast, they picture flood zones and waterfront properties. But buyers in New Jersey’s Monmouth and Ocean counties are running into a different problem – one that catches people off guard. Standard homeowners insurance, the basic coverage every mortgage lender requires, has become harder to obtain ...

People still move to Florida expecting a bargain. No state income tax, warm weather, reasonable home prices – that was the pitch for decades. But buyers relocating to Tampa Bay in 2026 are discovering a cost structure that the listing price doesn’t reveal: insurance premiums driven up by hurricane risk, property taxes that run higher ...

Banks price foreclosure homes to attract owner-occupants, but most of those homes cannot pass the appraisals that owner-occupants need to get a mortgage. The result, according to Janet Knopp, Principal Broker / Agent at Capital Region Preferred Properties LLC, is a market where REO properties sit in limbo, wanted by two buyer types but workable ...

During the post-COVID frenzy, entry-level buyers in Arizona’s West Valley were effectively priced out, not always by the home itself, but by the terms surrounding it. Prices ran up, sellers refused to help with closing costs, and the math didn’t work for someone who’d scraped together a down payment but had nothing left over. According ...

A population that doubles sounds like guaranteed appreciation. More people means more demand, which means your home is worth more, right? That is the assumption many buyers carry into fast-growing markets. But in Collier County, Florida, where local economic development officials project the population could double within the next eight to ten years, the math ...

In most housing markets, down payment assistance helps first-time buyers close a gap they could eventually bridge on their own. In Baltimore City in 2026, it has become the deciding factor in whether a finished rehab sells or sits, according to Salinda Adams, a Realtor and home improvement contractor at United Real Estate Executives who ...

When buyers look at Chicago and see property tax rates pushing toward 2 percent – sometimes higher in the suburbs, most recoil. But according to Chris Katsulis, Founder & Team Leader of the C. Thomas Group at The Nav Agency in Chicago, that heavy tax burden may be doing homeowners a favor by suppressing the ...

For most sellers, pricing a home “at market value” sounds like the responsible move. Pull comps, match the range, list. But in parts of West Austin right now, pricing at market value is functionally the same as overpricing, and sellers who want to move their homes in a reasonable timeframe need to list below it. ...

Homeowners in Lake Nona, Florida, who purchased between 2021 and 2023 and then refinanced to pull out equity are now discovering they cannot sell without writing a check at closing. The pattern is still small in scale, but it carries echoes of a much larger crisis, and it is already showing up in closed transactions. ...

Converting a parcel from general commercial zoning to a mixed-use planned unit development in Lebanon, Ohio, took less effort than getting a routine construction permit in a larger city nearby. That speed gap between small municipalities and major metros has direct consequences for homeowners and buyers near rezoned corridors; the commercial character of a neighborhood ...

In most housing markets, the question “what did that house sell for?” anchors every negotiation. Buyers pull comps, sellers cite recent closings, and both sides argue over which sale best reflects current value. But in North Texas, a nondisclosure state where sold prices never appear on public records, that anchor barely exists. As of mid-2026, ...