Housing Bubble 2: Return of the Ugly

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-07-02/shift-occurring-in-us-housing-market-as-mortgage-lock-loosens-up

More older lower-rate mortgages are being replaced by newer borrowing with higher financing costs, gradually pushing up the average loan rate for US homes, Intercontinental Exchange Inc. data show.

Four million first-lien mortgages originated since 2022 have a rate above 6.5%, and about 1.9 million these have a rate of 7% or higher, according to the ICE Mortgage Monitor Report.

“As of May, 24% of homeowners with mortgages now have a current interest rate of 5% or higher,” Andy Walden, vice president of ICE Research and Analysis, said in a statement. “As recently as two years ago an astonishing nine of every 10 mortgage holders were below that threshold.”

The active mortgage market is gradually shifting as people age out of their homes, retire or experience a life-changing event that compels the sale of a home with an older, lower-rate loan.

“All in, there are 5.8M fewer sub-5% mortgages in the market today than there were at this time in 2022,” Walden said. “This has been a slow-moving change, as borrowers with lower rates have sold their homes or, to a smaller degree, refinanced to withdraw equity.”

A greater share of homes with loans closer to the prevailing rate will likely spur more churn in the real estate market as more people become willing to relocate for a job or other opportunity, and less fearful of losing a fixed-loan rate mortgage.

Homeowners with a mortgage closer to prevailing rates will also likely boost the refinance market when the Federal Reserve starts cutting rates later this year as expected

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/17143734

> Following tradition, within means

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/17016636

> Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless people sleeping outside, even when shelter space is lacking > > The Oregon case decided Friday is the most significant to come before the high court in decades on the issue and comes as a rising number of people in the U.S. are without a permanent place to live.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/16933230

> Also "parasite".

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/16862977

> ‘Too many old people’: A rural Pa. town reckons with population loss > > There is a deepening sense of fear as population loss accelerates in rural America. The decline of small-town life is expected to be a looming topic in the presidential election. > > … > > America’s rural population began contracting about a decade ago, according to statistics drawn from the U.S. Census Bureau. > > A whopping 81 percent of rural counties had more deaths than births between 2019 and 2023, according to an analysis by a University of New Hampshire demographer. Experts who study the phenomena say the shrinking baby boomer population and younger residents having smaller families and moving elsewhere for jobs are fueling the trend. > > According to a recent Agriculture Department estimate, the rural population did rebound by 0.25 percent from 2020 to 2022 as some families decamped from urban areas during the pandemic. > > But demographers say they are still evaluating whether that trend will continue, and if so, where. > Pennsylvania has been particularly afflicted. Job losses in the manufacturing and energy industries that began in the 1980s prompted many younger families to relocate to Sun Belt states. The relocations helped fuel population surges in places like Texas and Georgia. But here, two-thirds of the state’s 67 counties have experienced a drop in population in recent years. > > > Non-paywall link