The Real Estate News Brief: Another Big Rate Hike, Housing Inventory Surge, New Rent Payment System

In this Real Estate News Brief for the week ending November 5th, 2022... the Fed’s latest rate hike, why the housing inventory is surging, and what one big bank is doing to help landlords collect rent.

Hi, I'm Kathy Fettke and this is Real Estate News for Investors. If you like our podcast, please subscribe and leave us a review.

Economic News

We begin with economic news from this past week, and another jumbo rate hike by the Fed. For the fourth time in a row, the central bank raised the Federal Funds rate by three-quarters of a point. That brings the short-term rate to a range of 3.75 to 4%, which is the highest it’s been in 15 years. And the Fed says that rate hikes aren’t over. They will continue until inflation comes back down to about 2%. Fed Chief Jerome Powell suggested that smaller hikes of a half or quarter point “are coming” and that at some point “it will be appropriate to slow the pace of increases” but they are now expected to top out around 5% before the Fed accomplishes its goal. (1) (2)

Economists are keeping an eye on the job market as the economy slows, but initial jobless claims were down slightly this last week, to 217,000. Some economists had expected a higher number, but the job market remains strong. The number of continuing claims also remains near a 50-year low, but they were up 47,000 to 1.49 million. Job creation numbers were a little slower, but not slow enough to help control inflation. Meanwhile, the unemployment rate rose from 3.5% to 3.7% which shows that the labor market has gotten a wee bit smaller. Powell says it’s still out of balance with too many job openings and not enough people to fill them. (3)

Construction spending rebounded in September. The Commerce Department says it rose .2% after a .6% decline in August. Those figures include a .3% gain for multi-family construction and a 2.6% decline for single-family projects. Homebuilders are pulling back on single-family homes as higher mortgage rates scare buyers away. The year-over-year rate for construction spending is 10.9%. (4)

Mortgage Rates

After topping the 7% level, Freddie Mac says the average 30-year fixed-rate mortgage was down 13 basis points, to 6.95%. The 15-year was down 7 points to 6.29%. (5)

In other news making headlines...

Housing Inventory Hits Two-Year High

The nation’s inventory of for-sale homes is now the highest it’s been in more than two years. Realtor.com says that new listings are down more than 15%, but that active listings are up 33.5% because homes are sitting on the market longer. Realtor.com’s chief economist Danielle Hale says homes spent a median of 51 days on the market in October which is six days more than October of last year. (6)

Unfortunately for buyers, it’s not making it any easier to afford the high price of purchasing a home. The median price of a home is up 13.3% year-over-year along with higher loan costs. Hale says: “Home shoppers are looking at a monthly mortgage payment that is roughly $1,000 higher than at this time last year.”

Global Construction to Rise 60% in 15 Years

While the U.S. housing market has slowed down substantially, there’s a new report estimating a 60% increase in global construction over the next 15 years. The Global Construction and Infrastructure Group says that climate change will drive a lot of that construction, creating new industries and job opportunities. (7)

Construction economist Graham Robinson told Strategic Risk: “With the built environment accounting for almost 40% of all greenhouse gas emissions globally, the transition to clean energy and new resilient infrastructure will boost growth for construction.”

Various reports show that the climate crisis has put an enormous number of homes at risk. Climate Central says an estimated $34 billion of coastal real estate could be flooded on a regular basis sometime in the next three decades. A Redfin analysis claims that more than half of all homes in the last decade are at risk of wildfires, and almost half of all homes are at risk of drought.

Ditching the Rent Checks

JP Morgan Chase wants to be your property manager. The banking giant launched a new property management platform for multi-family landlords. The software will send out invoices and accept rent payments from tenants. (8)

Although some landlords are using digital payment systems right now, the bank says that more than three-quarters of all rent checks are still being paid by check. Many tenants reportedly say the only reason they still have a checkbook is to pay their rent.

The software also provides tools for tenant screening and determining how much rent you should charge.

That’s it for today. Check the show notes for links. And please remember to hit the subscribe button, and leave a review!

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Thanks for listening. I'm Kathy Fettke.

Links:

1 -https://www.marketwatch.com/story/fed-approves-another-jumbo-interest-rate-hike-adds-dovish-language-on-way-forward-11667412237?mod=mw_latestnews

2 -https://www.marketwatch.com/livecoverage/stock-market-today-11-02/card/powell-plays-both-hawk-and-dove-SPP7tK0ARPzG8z8nFngw?mod=article_inline

3 -https://www.marketwatch.com/story/jobless-dip-to-217-000-and-stay-near-pandemic-lows-11667479161?mod=economic-report

4 -https://www.reuters.com/markets/us/us-construction-spending-unexpectedly-rebounds-september-2022-11-01/#:~:text=The%20Commerce%20Department%20said%20on,on%2Dyear%20basis%20in%20September.

5 -https://www.freddiemac.com/pmms

6 -https://www.mansionglobal.com/articles/u-s-housing-inventory-surpassed-hits-a-two-year-high-as-demand-cools-01667473524

7 -https://www.bisnow.com/national/news/construction-development/global-construction-set-to-grow-by-60-over-next-decade-and-a-half-report-116018

8 - https://therealdeal.com/national/2022/10/31/jpmorgan-wants-you-to-rip-up-your-rent-checks/