06/24/2008

Dallas home prices fell 3.4 percent in April from a year earlier

FILE/AP

U.S. home prices have retreated to levels last seen in August 2004.

The Dallas-Fort Worth decline in April was just a fraction of the 15.3 percent fall-off in home prices in the 20 cities surveyed in the Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller home price index released Tuesday. It was the largest such nationwide drop in home prices on record.
Map: Dallas-Fort Worth home sales and prices

07/03/2008

Foreclosures of Dallas-Fort Worth homes worth more than $1M double
The mortgage meltdown that started out with mostly moderate- and low-income borrowers is spreading to more affluent homeowners. Foreclosures of $1 million-plus houses are the fastest growing segment of the Dallas-Fort Worth distressed home market, according to a new study.

07/01/2008

Report: Dallas-Fort Worth has lowest risk for home-price declines
The latest report by mortgage insurance company PMI Group ranked the Dallas-Fort Worth area dead last among the 50 cities it rates for possible home price declines.

06/30/2008

Wachovia quits offering risky mortgage loan
Beleaguered consumer bank Wachovia Corp. will quit offering a mortgage payment option that allows borrowers to pay less each month than the bank charges in interest.

06/26/2008

U.S. pre-owned home sales edge higher, prices fall
The National Association of Realtors reported that sales of existing single-family homes and condominiums rose by 2 percent to 4.99 million units last month

06/25/2008

U.S. new home sales, prices tumble
The Commerce Department reported Wednesday that new homes were sold at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 512,000 units in May, down 2.5 percent from the April level. The median price of a new home sold last month fell to $231,000, down 5.7 percent from a year ago.

06/19/2008

Texas leads nation in FHA-backed home loans
And Fort Worth and Dallas have some of the highest volumes in the country, FHA Commissioner Brian Montgomery said Thursday.

06/16/2008

Homebuilder sentiment index falls in June
The report reflects a survey of 370 residential developers nationwide, tracking builders' perceptions of current market conditions and expectations for home sales over the next six months.

06/12/2008

Dallas-Fort Worth home foreclosures unusually high for July
You’d think a 33 percent jump in home foreclosures would be sign of a deeper downturn for the Dallas-Fort Worth housing market. But the surge in foreclosure postings for next month has more to do with how the calendar falls than more woes for borrowers.

06/09/2008

Dallas-Fort Worth pre-owned home sales drop 12%, prices rise

MICHAEL AINSWORTH/DMN

More than 7,700 pre-owned single-family homes in North Texas were sold last month.

Home sales dropped 12 percent in North Texas last month. Even with the decline, overall prices eked out a 1 percent gain from a year ago. A median priced home sold for $154,000 in May — the highest price since last summer.

Report: U.S. pending home sales move higher
The National Association of Realtors said Monday its seasonally adjusted index of pending sales for existing homes rose to 88.2 from a March reading of 83.0, the index's low. The index stood at 101.5 in April 2007.

06/05/2008

U.S. home foreclosures set record in first quarter

FILE/AP

California, Florida, Nevada and Arizona accounted for 89 percent of the total increase in new home foreclosures.

The latest snapshot of the mortgage market showed that the proportion of mortgages that fell into foreclosure soared to 0.99 percent in the first quarter. That surpassed the previous high of 0.83 percent over the last three months in 2007.
Map: 2007 Dallas-Fort Worth foreclosures by ZIP code

05/27/2008

S&P: Dallas home prices drop 3.3% as U.S. values tumble

AP

The Standard & Poor’s Case-Shiller index compares home price changes in 20 major U.S. cities, all but one of which showed declines.

Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller said its national home price index fell 14.1 percent in the first quarter compared with a year earlier, the lowest since its inception in 1988, a somber indication that the housing slump continues to deepen.
U.S. new home sales post unexpected increase
Area homebuilders feel sting of housing slump

05/28/2008

Settlement reached for online real estate agents
The Justice Department gave a boost Tuesday to online real estate brokers – and potentially their clients – by forcing new industry policies that give Internet-based agents access to home listings they were previously denied.

05/27/2008

U.S. new home sales post unexpected increase
The Commerce Department reported Tuesday that sales of new homes rose 3.3 percent in April to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 526,000 units.

Dallas-Fort Worth homebuilders feel sting of housing slump

JUAN GARCIA/DMN

Bricks lie in tall grass awaiting a homebuilder on Jasper Drive in Frisco.

North Texas may not be bearing the brunt of the national housing bust, but some local businesses are feeling the pain. Several homebuilders have gone out of business. Others are scaling back their operations, cutting jobs as revenue and profit fall.

05/23/2008

New Dallas County property appraisals could boost Dallas' tax revenue by 5 percent
Dallas County's property-value boom of years past has reached its inevitable end, and appraisal growth has begun to slow in the midst of a softening housing market and a slowdown in commercial construction.
Tell us: Plan to appeal your appraisal?
Download: Map of appraisal change (.pdf)

05/22/2008

Report: Dallas-Fort Worth home prices rise; U.S. values plunge

FILE/AP

Federal analysts said the U.S. home price decline was the biggest first-quarter drop since they began collecting the data 17 years ago.

The latest nationwide home price report shows overall housing prices in the Dallas area rose by about 3.76 percent in the first quarter. That compares with a 3.1 percent nationwide decline.
Map: Dallas-Fort Worth home sales and prices

05/16/2008

Housing construction posts surprising rebound in April
The Commerce Department reported Friday that housing construction rose by 8.2 percent in April to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.03 million units. Building of single-family homes continued to weaken, however. The growth came from a big jump in apartment construction.
Residential real estate news

05/27/2008

Home sales post unexpected April increase
Sales of new homes rose in April for the first time in six months although the unexpected increase still left activity near the lowest level in 17 years.

05/13/2008

Dallas-Fort Worth home prices down as national slump continues

Getty Images

In the D-FW area median single-family home sales prices were down 2.1 percent from first quarter 2007, and prices nationwide plunged 7.7 percent in the first three months of 2008.
Interactive map: D-FW home sales and prices
Residential real estate news

05/08/2008

Report: Dallas-Fort Worth is a good place to build home equity

FILE/AP

Residential values in many coastal cities have decreased dramatically and are still falling.

A new study projects that D-FW homebuyers could see one of the best increases in equity in the country during the next few years. But analysts caution not to get carried away with the data.
House passes housing rescue plan
Realtors say lending practices holding back housing recovery

05/09/2008

U.S. housing rebound is a long way off, industry leaders say
Economists and housing industry leaders meeting in Dallas this week predict it will be very late 2008 or into 2009 before the battered home market begins to recover.

Leslie Berkman: Surviving the bubble's burst in Riverside, California
A couple of years ago, it seemed Inland Southern California housing prices had nowhere to go but up. Homeowners gasped and thanked their lucky stars as each month they grew richer.

Home prices up overall, but not in all areas of Dallas
Tax values of Dallas-area homes have jumped about 70 percent since the early 1990s. But the recent increases differ dramatically by area of town.
Interactive map: Dallas-Fort Worth home sales and prices
Experts: Market recovery to be slow
Steve Brown: Area Housing values are slow to rise, slow to fall

05/08/2008

Realtors say lending practices holding back housing recovery
Irving real estate agent Charles McMillan, president-elect of the National Association of Realtors, blames mortgage firms for keeping potential buyers out of the market.
Interactive map: 2007 Dallas-Fort Worth foreclosures by ZIP code
Dallas activist group plans foreclosure protest

05/07/2008

Dallas-Fort Worth pre-owned home sales drop 11%
Home sales prices in April were also down 3 percent from a year earlier, according to statistics released Wednesday from Texas A&M University’s Real Estate Center and the North Texas Real Estate Information Systems.

U.S. pending home sales hit new low in March
The National Association of Realtors' seasonally adjusted index of pending sales for existing homes fell to 83.0 from a downwardly revised February reading of 83.8, the index's previous low. The index stood at 103.9 in March 2007.

05/05/2008

Fed: Banks are tightening standards on mortgages, other loans
The Fed's survey, conducted in April, found that nearly two-thirds of banks surveyed had tightened lending standards on traditional home mortgages with 15 percent saying those standards had been tightened considerably.

05/02/2008

Wired for sound -- and plenty more

Drexel Development Co.

A dining room in this residence has lighting, heating and cooling controlled through an offshoot of "smart" wiring, which is becoming popular in new homes.

Say you're on a business trip in L.A. and want to cool down your place in Dallas before getting home. If your residence has "smart" wiring and certain high-tech tools, you could log in on your BlackBerry and punch in the desired temp. But that's just the beginning: You can control your lighting with a touch-screen unit, program your home's security system, even make sure Junior is doing his homework.

04/30/2008

Dallas homebuilder Centex loses over $910 million in 4th quarter
Centex closings for the quarter, which ended March 31, fell 33 percent from a year ago, the company said.

04/29/2008

Dallas-area home prices fall more than 4%
The benchmark S&P/Case-Shiller home price index found that Dallas-area home prices in February had dropped to the lowest point since April 2005.

04/28/2008

Vacant homes in U.S. set new record high
The Census Bureau report shows that 2.9 percent of U.S. homes – excluding rental properties – were vacant and up for sale, compared with 2.8 percent in the fourth quarter of 2007. It was the highest quarterly number in records going back to 1956.

04/26/2008

Hand-scraped floors add value to upscale homes

Bella Custom Homes

Hand-scraped flooring is popular in homes worth $1 million and up, builders report.

For new homes built with an Old World feel, builders often turn to a centuries-old wood-floor technique: hand-scraping.Traditional wood floors are machine-sanded to a smooth finish. With hand-scraped floors, tradesmen use a 2-inch-wide knife to shave tiny curls of wood from the floor to add texture and depth.

04/22/2008

Economist: U.S. housing slump may exceed Depression
Yale University economist Robert Shiller, pioneer of the widely watched Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller home price index, said there's a good chance housing prices will fall further than the 30 percent drop in the historic depression of the 1930s.

U.S. existing home sales fall
Sales of existing homes fell in March while the median home price declined, as a severe slump in housing showed no signs of abating.

04/17/2008

Dallas-Fort Worth home foreclosure postings rise 40%

FILE/AP

The biggest increases for May’s foreclosure sales are in Rockwall and Denton counties.

All the publicity about so-called “rescue” plans to help troubled homeowners isn’t having an impact so far on Dallas-Fort Worth foreclosures. The number of homes facing foreclosure in the D-FW area next month is up almost 40 percent from a year ago.

04/18/2008

Housing downturn now hitting upscale Dallas areas

MICHAEL AINSWORTH/DMN

The housing downturn is hitting almost every neighborhood in the Dallas area. Even affluent areas are seeing prices fall and home sales drop.
Map: Home sales and prices by neighborhood
Map: 2007 foreclosures by ZIP code
Foreclosures rise 40%
Mortgage rates, advice

Jumbo mortgages caught up in subprime fallout
For months, mortgage lenders have been backing away from borrowers with spotty credit, all but closing down the so-called subprime mortgage market.

04/14/2008

AP poll: Growing majority avoid buying homes
In a vivid sketch of how the sputtering real estate market is causing distress throughout the country, the Associated Press-AOL Money & Finance poll found that more than a quarter of homeowners worry their home will lose value over the next two years.

04/12/2008

Rounded corners adding to new homes' appeal

Toll Brothers

When it comes to new houses, area builders now think in terms of "curve" appeal.

Homes throughout the Dallas area, especially upscale ones, are incorporating rounded touches inside and out. The features may be as simple as drywall curved at the corners or as involved as barrel-vaulted ceilings and turrets. "Rounded amenities like arched front doors also help foster an Old World European environment," says Joe Washburn of Coventry Homes.

04/10/2008

Report: Dallas-Fort Worth won't see big home price declines
the latest report from mortgage insurance firm PMI Group says that the D-FW area is one of the last places in the country to expect dropping home prices during the next couple of years.

New report shows steeper drop in Dallas-Fort Worth home starts
Early numbers last week estimated that home starts in the area fell by 35 percent during the first three months of 2008. But a new report says the cut in building was even sharper – down 41 percent from a year ago, according to researchers at Residential Strategies Inc.

Senate passes bill to ease housing crisis
The plan combines large tax breaks for homebuilders and a $7,000 tax credit for people who buy foreclosed properties, as well as $4 billion in grants for communities to buy and fix up abandoned homes.

04/08/2008

U.S. pending home sales fall to new low
The National Association of Realtors says pending U.S. home sales fell to the lowest reading on record in February, signaling the housing market distress is not yet over.

04/07/2008

Dallas-Fort Worth sales of pre-owned homes drop 25%

Getty Images

Other U.S. markets have seen much steeper home price delinces.

The March decline in home sales – one of the steepest so far – was enough to put the entire first quarter into a double-digit downturn, according to preliminary statistics released Monday by the North Texas Real Estate Information System. Median prices were down only 1 percent during the quarter.

04/04/2008

Tray ceilings add dimension to homes

Centex

A model home in the Dallas area features a bedroom with a tray ceiling.

Tray ceilings are showing up in homes of all price ranges to give master bedrooms, media rooms, family rooms and entries an architectural highlight. The idea is to create the appearance of an indented ceiling to add drama and a sense of volume.

Dallas-Fort Worth avoids U.S. housing glut

FILE 2006/DMN

There is almost an 11-month supply of homes on the market nationwide, but in the D-FW area, the inventory of houses has stayed close to a six-month supply for the last four years.

The glut of homes for sale across the country is near a 20-year high. But in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, the number of pre-owned houses on the market hasn't increased significantly in the last two years.
New-home sales, starts drop
Dallas-Fort Worth home list prices rise

04/03/2008

Dallas-Fort Worth new-home sales, starts drop by about a third

FILE/AP

Analysts predict – and major builders promise – further cutbacks in D-FW home starts her this year.

The decline during the first three months of 2008 was almost twice the rate by which new home sales fell in all of 2007. And the drop in starts was even steeper – down 35 percent from a year earlier, according to statistics released Thursday by Metrostudy Inc., which tracks the local housing market.

List prices for Dallas-Fort Worth homes edge higher

Getty Images

Home sellers in many parts of the country are having to reduce prices.

In the Dallas area, list prices rose by an average of 2.8 percent in the first three months of 2008, while asking prices fell 1.7 percent nationally from year-end 2007, according to a report released Thursday by Altos Research Corp. and Real IQ.

Real estate Web site Zillow launches mortgage site
Armed with market research that showed Americans spend as much time researching a vacation as they do a mortgage loan (answer: five hours), Zillow.com is launching a mortgage marketplace that allows consumers to anonymously receive custom loan quotes and rate their lenders.

04/02/2008

Senate leaders agree on bill to ease foreclosure crisis
The scaled-back proposal released by Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and GOP Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky contains an amalgam of ideas aimed at boosting demand for housing and helping homeowners saddled with subprime mortgages avoid foreclosure.

Centex sells resort and second home projects
Macfarlan Capital Partners of Dallas acquired the properties, which total almost 4,000 acres. The sale represents about 30 percent of Centex’s resort property holdings.

Foreclosure relief bill clears first Senate hurdle

Getty Images

The legislation would provide billions of dollars to buy up foreclosed homes. It also would ensure that people who take out high-cost mortgages in the future aren't surprised by big payment increases.
Map: Dallas-Fort Worth foreclosures by ZIP code

04/01/2008

Housing weakness hits construction spending
Residential construction fell by 0.9 percent in February. Residential activity has fallen every month since March 2006, a record period of declines that underscored the severe downturn that is going on in housing.

03/28/2008

Plan outdoor living spaces before you build

David Weekley Homes

A Flynn model home in David Weekley Homes' Castle Hills development in Lewisville includes a covered outdoor living area with fireplace.

Buyers can look at a home and imagine poolside barbecues or dining outside every evening. But making that dream real requires planning the outdoor living space before the home is built.

Amenities are part of Lantana's master plan

JIM MAHONEY/Staff Photographer

Dave and Julia Thomas and their two high school-aged children moved to Lantana six years ago from Lake Kiowa.

Schools and day care are among the features that residents say drew them to Lantana, a master-planned community of about 6,200 in an unincorporated area of Denton County.

Report: Housing slump hitting second homes
Vacation home sales dropped by more than 30 percent last year from 2006, the National Association of Realtors said in a report released Friday.

03/25/2008

U.S. home price decline for January is record

FILE/AP

"Home prices continue to fall, decelerate and reach record lows across the nation," said S&P's David M. Blitzer.

Overall U.S. home prices fell by a record 11.4 percent in January, according to the S&P/Case-Shiller home price index released Tuesday morning. Half of the 20 cities surveyed had double-digit price drops in January compared to a year earlier.
Map: Dallas-Fort Worth home sales and prices

03/24/2008

Plan early, completely to light new home well

Elaine Williamson

Elaine Williamson, a Frisco-based interior designer, says buyers of new homes should consider lighting "from the very, very beginning."

A home's lights range from the grandest of chandeliers to small under-cabinet bulbs that shed light on kitchen tasks or tiny accent lights for art niches. New-home buyers have to find the right combination for their house and their lifestyle.

Skylights illuminate rooms, but watch for leaks

Seattle Times

Sunshine streams through a shower skylight in a Redmond, Wash., home.

When it comes to energy efficiency in new homes, few items have more proponents and detractors than the skylight. A skylight can provide more natural light and can help reduce condensation in a bathroom. But you need to make sure a skylight doesn't leak.

U.S. home sales post unexpected increase
The National Association of Realtors said that sales of existing homes rose by 2.9 percent in February to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.03 million units. It was the biggest increase in a year and caught economists by surprise. U.S. median home prices declined.
Stocks surge
Map: Dallas-Fort Worth home sales and prices

03/19/2008

Government to free up mortgage money
The government announced Wednesday that it is freeing up billions of dollars at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, money that would be used to help homeowners refinance mortgages on the brink of default.

03/17/2008

U.S. homebuilder sentiment remains low
The National Association of Home Builders said Monday its housing market index for March was the third lowest reading on record. The index, which gauges builders' perceptions of current conditions, interest from potential buyers and expectations for home sales over the next six months, came in at 20 in March for the second consecutive month.

03/13/2008

Tighter mortgage oversight urged
Stronger regulatory oversight of mortgage lenders is being recommended to avert any repetition of the credit crisis now threatening to plunge the country into recession, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said Thursday.

03/11/2008

New report shows Dallas-area home prices remain flat
Dallas had the second fastest home selling time among the 22 markets the researchers surveyed – 79 days. Only Denver had a shorter average home sales time.

03/07/2008

In Dallas-Fort Worth market, no flood of homes for sale
In February, the number of homes for sale through the Realtors’ multiple listing services fell by 1 percent from a year ago. And the number of new listings added to inventory last month was down 7 percent from last year, the North Texas Real Estate Information Service reported Friday.

03/06/2008

Economist: Dallas-Fort Worth home prices to hold steady despite U.S. decline

AP

Sales and starts of homes across the country should bottom out this year, Moody's predicts

Nationwide home prices are likely to keep falling into 2009, predicts economist Mark Zandi with Moody's Economy.com. But Dallas-Fort Worth home prices are forecast to remain relatively flat in Moody's latest estimate.
Report: Homeowner equity lowest on record
U.S. home foreclosures at record high last quarter

Report: Homeowner equity lowest on record
Americans' percentage of equity in their homes fell below 50 percent for the first time on record since 1945, the Federal Reserve said Thursday.

U.S. home foreclosures at record high last quarter
The Mortgage Bankers Association said Thursday the proportion of all mortgages that slipped into foreclosure set a record, 0.83 percent, from October through December. The previous high, 0.78 percent, came in the July-through-September period.

03/04/2008

Study: Dallas-Fort Worth homes are undervalued
While the buzz in the housing market these days is about popping price bubbles, a new national study says that Dallas-Fort Worth has one of the most undervalued housing markets in the country.

02/29/2008

Foreclosures cut wide swath across Dallas, Fort Worth

FILE/AP

Other areas of the country have seen an even greater surge in foreclosures.

There were more than 19,000 residential foreclosures in the Dallas-Fort Worth area last year. And thousands more houses are falling into default every month.
DeSoto neighborhood hit hard by foreclosures
Map: See foreclosures by ZIP code

02/28/2008

Dallas homebuilders launch ad blitz to lure buyers

FILE/AP

Almost 10,000 vacant new homes are on the market in the D-FW area, and builders are offering significant incentives to move them.

Homebuilders who are sick of reading about the housing downturn are hoping to attract buyers with their own message. The Homebuilders Association of Metro Dallas has teamed up with builders, developers and financial institutions to fund an ad blitz aimed at attracting buyers.
DFWHousing Facts Web site

02/27/2008

U.S. new home sales fall again
In more bad news for the beleaguered housing industry, sales of new homes fell in January for a third straight month, pushing activity down to the slowest pace in nearly 13 years. The median price of a new home dropped to the lowest level in more than three years.

02/26/2008

Dallas home prices drop in one survey, rise in another

AP

Dallas' housing market so far has held up better than other U.S. markets such as Los Angeles.

The latest research on Dallas-area home prices will cause some head-scratching. One report released Tuesday says local home prices were down at the end of the year, while a second benchmark national survey found they were still rising.
Map: Dallas-Fort Worth home sales and prices by neighborhood

02/25/2008

U.S. existing home sales hit 9-year low
Sales of existing homes fell to the lowest level in nearly a decade in January while the median price for a home dropped for the fifth straight month.

02/20/2008

Walk-throughs key before new-home closing

FILE 2007/Getty Images

Painters work to finish a new home in Miami.

When buyers first walk through a new house after the construction dust settles, they can become smitten. But it's important to take time to see that everything meets the contract specifications.
Home walkthrough checklist
Walkthrough checklist for new or newly remodeled home

02/19/2008

Remodeling on decline nationwide

MICHAEL HOGUE/DMN

Those fancy home fix-ups touted in cable TV shows and home magazines are losing their luster with consumers. With the shakeout in the housing market, homeowners are worried they won’t get their money back from high-dollar redos and lenders are less willing to finance pricey home improvements.

Homebuilder confidence rises some
Builder confidence in the housing market rose a little in February, according to the latest reading on the housing market index released by the National Association of Home Builders and Well Fargo on Tuesday.

02/14/2008

Dallas-Fort Worth home prices rise a little in latest survey

FILE/AP

California continued to see some of the biggest price declines in the fourth quarter.

The Dallas-Fort Wo