Consumer

A nonprofit in Delaware is building cottage-style homes for roughly 25 to 30 percent less than what outside contractors would charge for the same work, according to its founder. That cost advantage drives some of the lowest rents and purchase prices in the state’s new housing pipeline. But the advantage depends almost entirely on one ...

The biggest financial mistake many first-time home buyers in the Pittsburgh area make has nothing to do with interest rates, bidding wars, or neighborhood choice, according to Janette Schafer, a real estate agent with Coldwell Banker Realty. Schafer, who works extensively with first-time buyers in the greater Pittsburgh market, says too many buyers are still ...

Year-over-year home price declines near 20 percent in Austin, Texas, have made national news, painting a picture of a market in retreat. But that number blends two very different markets, according to Nitin Kumar, a residential agent and investor with eXp Realty in Austin. One is the established suburbs near Austin’s job centers. The other ...

Borrowers shopping for a mortgage tend to compare interest rates first, treating the lowest number as the best deal. But that instinct can backfire when a lower rate requires thousands of dollars in upfront fees to secure – fees that many homeowners never recoup before they sell. Sam Verma, who founded Cohivra, Inc., a mortgage ...

Tracy, California, has built its housing market on a simple bargain: drive an hour to a Bay Area job, get twice the house for half the price. But that bargain is under pressure. Interest rates have climbed, the broader economy has softened, and the rising cost of gasoline and diesel has made long commutes harder ...

Buyers evaluate a home based on what exists right now – the school down the road, the fire station response time, the condition of the nearest interchange. But in fast-growing small counties, what the local government is building today may matter more to long-term property values than anything visible on a drive-through. In New Kent ...

In a city where home values climbed sharply during the pandemic, some Austin agents are now telling sellers to stay off the market. The advice runs against the industry’s transactional incentives, but the logic is direct: in several Austin price ranges, the buyer pool has thinned enough that listing now risks closing below purchase price. ...

A self-employed borrower whose business deposits fifty thousand dollars a month can look, on a conventional mortgage application, like someone earning three thousand. That gap between actual cash flow and qualifying income is pushing business owners in the Chicago area out of the mortgage market entirely – not because they lack the money, but because ...

The path to a first home in the Dallas-Fort Worth suburbs has always required compromise. But the gap between what younger buyers want and what they can actually afford has stretched to a point where many are simply not buying, according to Karen Wydra, a 25-year residential agent with Ebby Halliday working the Garland and ...

A condo has long been the natural first step for budget-conscious buyers. It is usually cheaper than a detached home, requires less maintenance, and sits closer to urban job centers. But in Boulder, Colorado, and across the Denver metro area, many first-time buyers are skipping condos and choosing single-family homes instead. The reasons go beyond ...

Two homes listed at $400,000 in the Dallas-Fort Worth metro can carry noticeably different monthly mortgage payments, depending on the county or school district. The gap has nothing to do with the loan or the lender. It comes down to property taxes. Buyers who ignore that line item may misjudge what they can afford. Kristyn ...

In the suburbs north of Austin, Texas, builders are cutting prices so aggressively that some signed contracts are falling apart. Affordability and high interest rates still play a role. But Ahmad Homidi, a real estate agent with eXp Realty, says the pattern he is seeing right now is different. Buyers back out after a competing ...

When national builders offer rate buydowns, closing-cost credits, and upgrade packages to move inventory, buyers gain leverage. The incentive itself is a signal: the builder needs you more than you need the builder. In the custom luxury market of Wake Forest, North Carolina, those signals do not exist. That absence shapes how buyers negotiate. Dave ...

Buy a home in the San Francisco East Bay for $1.3 million, rent it for $4,500 a month, and the yield looks thin next to what lower-cost markets across the country deliver. This yield gap sends many investors elsewhere. Lisa Doyle argues they are using the wrong measure. A real estate professional at The Doyle ...

There is a growing divide in the Florida Keys housing market, and it runs along a single fault line: whether a buyer needs a mortgage. Cash buyers – many of them retirees and business owners from out of state – are driving the market’s strongest numbers. Buyers who depend on financing face compounding costs that ...