The housing market is stronger today than at any point since the Great Recession and has made progress in several key areas after hitting bottom in 2009, Freddie Mac reports in a blog post looking at the state of the housing market heading into spring.
Home sales are up 13 percent since their low point, Freddie Mac reports. Frank Notaft, Freddie Mac’s chief economist, predicts that home sales will rise about 3 percent in 2014.
Also, the agency reports that housing starts are up 50 percent since hitting bottom. Freddie Mac is predicting a nearly 20 percent increase in new-housing starts in 2014, “which will begin to help ease tight inventories in many markets.”
Housing prices have also been on the upswing, about 16 percent higher than their bottom in 2009, Freddie Mac reports. They expect home values to continue to rise this year, but at a more moderate 5 percent pace. Also, researchers say many markets are still posting housing values that are below their 2006 peaks.
Freddie Mac is forecasting mortgage rates to remain near their historic lows this year, but rates are expected to rise about a half-percentage point during the year to around a 5 percent average by the end of the year.
Source: “After Winter Chill, Time to Spring Forward,” Freddie Mac (April 10, 2014)
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In order to have a fully recovered housing market and economic recovery, economists point to the need for four positive indicators:
1. A healthy job market with low stable unemployment;
2. Mortgage delinquencies that have returned to historical averages;
3. Home prices consistent with an affordable mortgage payment–to–income ratio; and
4. Home sales that are in the range of historical norms.
So, is the housing market inching closer?
Freddie Mac’s U.S. Economic and Housing Market Outlook for January takes a look at how the housing market is performing among these four indicators. Economists note that the unemployment rate — while inching down — still remains high at 6.7 percent. Meanwhile, mortgage delinquencies have fallen to 5.88 percent — nearly half of their peak rate but still higher than the national average of about 2 percent, Freddie notes.
Home prices still have some room to grow without outpacing income growth, economists say.
“From 1999–2006, mortgage payments on a hypothetical 30-year fixed-rate mortgage would have increased by 50 percent more than income growth,” Freddie Mac notes in the report. “Currently, payment-to-income ratios are only 60 percent of the level we had in 1999, suggesting room for continued housing growth.”
Finally, home sales have risen over the past two years but remain below levels from a nearly a decade ago. Home sales, historically, average a rate of about 6 percent of the housing stock every year. They dropped to 4 percent during the housing crisis. Economists are predicting a 5.7 percent pace in 2014.
“As we start 2014, the housing recovery continues its steady pace,” Frank Nothaft, Freddie Mac’s chief economist. “House-price gains will likely moderate from last year’s pace but rise about 5 percent in national indexes. Home sales, as well as other key indicators, continue to trend in the right direction, although in some markets we are seeing the sales recovery strengthen while many others remain weak.”
In a historical context, home prices typically increase about 3 to 4 percent a year.
But in the years preceding the housing crash, prices in 2002 started soaring 7 percent a year, then 8 percent in 2004, and 12 percent by 2005, CNBC.com reports.
A “new bubble” may be forming, CNBC columnist Diana Olick writes. CoreLogic’s latest housing data shows home prices rose 8 percent in December year-over-year, the largest gain in more than six years. In some places, home prices are up by double digits from a year ago, like Phoenix where prices are up 26 percent year-over-year.
Inventories of for-sale homes are very tight and many are attributing the tight inventories as helping to drive up home prices. Inventories were at their lowest supply since May 2005, according to the National Association of REALTORS®.
“The greatest concern in the market is the inventory situation,” says Lawrence Yun, chief economist for NAR. “Even if we see an increase in the spring and summer, if home sales hold at the [current] level or even a 5- to 6-month supply, price increases are guaranteed. We don’t want to see rapid appreciation in prices faster than income.”
CNBC reporter Diana Olick notes that “healthy housing market gains are historically driven by increasing employment and income, not by lack of supply; the latter leads to price bubbles.”
But another part driving recent gains are the flood of investors in some markets. Investors are cashing in on once hard-hit markets by the foreclosure crisis, like in California, Las Vegas, and Phoenix. Many of these investors are hedge funds turning single-family homes into rentals, but as prices increase they may be inclined to take their profits sooner rather than later, Olick writes.
“What we had thought were safer, long term buys, may now turn into flips of the last decade,” Olick writes. “The question will be if there are enough non-investor buyers out there to support those sales?”
But the price gains may be sustainable, some say. Consumer confidence is increasing, employment is improving, and price gains may soon allow more home owners who are seeing equity once again trade-up, Olick writes.
Staff photo of Lawrence Yun (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Pending home sales retrenched in April following three consecutive monthly gains, but are notably higher than a year ago, according to the National Association of REALTORS®.
The Pending Home Sales Index, a forward-looking indicator based on contract signings, declined 5.5 percent to 95.5 from a downwardly revised 101.1 in March but is 14.4 percent above April 2011 when it was 83.5. The data reflect contracts but not closings.
Lawrence Yun, NAR chief economist, said a one-month setback in light of many months of gains does not change the fundamentally improving housing market conditions. “Home contract activity has been above year-ago levels now for 12 consecutive months. The housing recovery momentum continues,” he said.
Yun notes home sales are staying well above the levels seen from 2008 through 2011. “Housing market activity has clearly broken out at notably higher levels and is on track to see the best performance since 2007,” he said. “All of the major housing market indicators are expected to trend gradually up, but a new federal budget must be passed before the end of the year for the economy to continue to move forward.”
The PHSI in the Northeast rose 0.9 percent to 78.9 in April and is 19.9 percent higher than April 2011. In the Midwest the index slipped 0.3 percent to 93.0 but is 23.0 percent above a year ago. Pending home sales in the South fell 6.8 percent to an index of 105.7 in April but are 13.3 percent higher than April 2011. In the West the index dropped 12.0 percent in April to 94.9 but is 5.1 percent above a year ago.
The housing forecast has been upgraded, with existing-home sales expected to reach 4.66 million this year, compared with 4.26 million in 2011. The outlook for 2013 is now 4.92 million, but could vary significantly depending on two scenarios.
If lending returns to normal, the 2013 outlook for existing-home sales would measurably improve to 5.3 million. However, a fiscal cliff scenario of higher taxes and sharp spending cuts beginning in early 2013, which is an unlikely event but still worth noting, would lower the sales projection to 4.5 million.
Because of measurably lower inventory supplies, the forecast for home prices has been upwardly revised with the median existing-home price projected to rise 2 to 3 percent this year and 4 to 5 percent in 2013, with wide local market variations. Miami and Phoenix will easily achieve double-digit price growth by year end.
Yun said the price gains will measurably reduce the number of underwater homeowners. “For example, a 5 percent national price gain means the number of underwater home owners would fall to about 9 million from current estimates of around 11 million. A 10 percent gain, say over the next two years, would reduce the underwater status to about 7 million households out of 75 million owner-occupied homes,” he said.
About 25 million homes are owned free and clear without a mortgage.
Though the proportion of distressed properties is still high, the numbers have been falling over the past two years. “The diminishing share of distressed properties is another reason for higher home prices in upcoming months,” Yun added.
