The big mortgage rate drops that are helping the real estate industry ring in the new year shouldn’t be taken as a sign that home sellers will come out of the woodwork in 2024, the top economists at two mortgage market heavyweights say.
In its attempt to address the dire housing crisis, the Federal Housing Finance Agency is considering a policy that would surely make it worse and reduce the use of federal housing dollars.
Fannie Mae is adding another year to a pilot program that can help landlords boost tenants’ credit scores by reporting on-time rental payments, and making it free for more landlords to join.
Two recently released reports raised hopes that the real estate market in Massachusetts might be reheating a bit after months of slower-than-normal activity.
Fannie Mae’s monthly survey of consumer sentiment about the housing industry contains hints that consumers may finally be getting used to the seemingly-intractable combination of high interest rates and high home prices that’s choking residential real estate markets around the country.
The national economy is running out of steam and further declines in home prices are expected, economists at Fannie Mae forecast, but interest rates could start falling by year’s end.
Saying it needs to modernize the way it values properties, Fannie Mae announced significant changes yesterday to the appraisal process for single-family mortgages it buys on the secondary market.
Leading housing economists at Fannie Mae now predict that home prices will shrink next year, instead of growing 4.4 percent as they had previously forecast.
Fannie Mae’s top economic minds issued a depressing prognosis for the nation’s housing sector as mortgage rates took another big jump and Fed Chair Jerome Powell said housing needs “a correction.”
The mortgage market is in for another big shift in a few months. That’s when a sizable increase – roughly 12 percent or 13 percent – in the conforming loan limit appears likely to be announced.
Economists at Fannie Mae expect a significant drop in sales of existing single-family homes this year, along with a significant jump in the start of construction on multifamily buildings.
The share of consumers who think it’s a less-than-optimal time to buy or sell a home keeps ticking upwards as interest rates rise and housing affordability drops.
The latest Fannie Mae survey of consumer homebuying sentiment shows that Americans are of opposite minds when it comes to buying and selling homes.
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac shut many self-employed buyers out during the pandemic. But now, those rules are gone and some lenders, perhaps sensing a grand opportunity to boost market share, are targeting gig workers directly.
An ambitious effort by one of the biggest players in the mortgage market, Freddie Mac, to open up renters’ access to credit is relying on landlords to help. But few landlords and property managers know the effort exists.
A record low 25 percent of respondents in Fannie Mae’s latest monthly Home Purchase Sentiment Index survey said it was a good time to buy a home.
Fannie Mae’s and Freddie Mac’s respective economic forecast teams have issued their 2022 predictions, and both foresee a leveling off of last year’s meteoric home price growth across the nation’s housing markets.
For the next 60-odd days, some homebuyers have an unusual opportunity to find financing at a tad lower cost.
Federal housing regulators want input from industry and community groups on how Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will measure their own efforts to reduce racial inequality in the mortgage market.
White House officials are outlining plans to build and restore more than 2 million homes, a response to the volcanic rise in housing prices over the past year.
