Month: August 2011

National Survey Suggests Strong Real Estate Investment Desire

Alex Kent

Some really interesting statistics came out in Move Inc’s recent home buyer survey.

Of the 1,200 U.S. adults surveyed 200 were real estate investors. A third of those were planning on buying with the next two years, and about 8.6% of the typical home buyers were.

Some other interesting statistics include 56.5% of investors who said repair and maintenance of their properties hadn’t been a huge burden, 75% plan to combine cash and credit for their purchase, 59% of the investors said they were new to investing, less than 40% had previous property transaction experience. And 53% expect home prices to stay steady for the next six to 12 months.

Lots of interesting figures in the report, check out a good synopsis at No Radar Real Estate.

Phoenix, Atlanta Best Markets For Newly Built Homes

Alex Kent

If you’re in the market for buying, flipping or selling off an inventory of new homes you might want to take a look at Phoenix and Atlanta, at least according to a recent report from Barclays Capital. Bloomberg interviewed one of the reports authors.

“The reality is that housing is a region-by-region story,” said Vincent Foley. “And most of the big public homebuilders are reasonably positioned to benefit from an upturn because they’re in the right markets.”

Surprised? That’s the adjective Barclay’s analysts used as well. They also said that regions who pushed foreclosures through quicker are on track to recover sooner than others.

There’s a lot of great information in Bloomberg’s article about the Barclays report in Phoenix and Atlanta Will Be Best New-Home Markets in U.S., Barclays Says. It’s definitely worth a read, especially if you’re dying to read some positive news in the U.S. housing market.

Big Mortgage Backed Security Deal Good Sign For REITs

Alex Kent

UBS and Deutsche Bank recently approved a $1.4 billion deal to securitize a basket of commercial real estate. Securitization makes it safer for banks to lend to REITs and other real estate investors. For example, if they made a loan for $200 million, they would keep $100 on their books and securitize the other half. Good news for everybody in the deal, banks are more comfortable to loan, and it gives REITs and small real estate investors access to credit. For more info read CNBC’s Good Sign for REITs, Banks, Commercial Real Estate.