By Peter Ricci Monthly mortgage payments in the Lone Star State are pretty average, according to an expansive study by Lending Tree of the various states’ mortgage payments in the last 12 months. As Lending Tree found, monthly mortgage payments

By Peter Ricci Now that the real estate markets have begun a slow, steady recovery, it’s become commonplace for analysts to debate what factors are holding back housing from the rollicking, surging recovery we all dream about. From negative

By Peter Ricci Texas home prices continued their 2012 surge, with prices in Dallas rising 4.4 percent year-over-year in September in the latest Case-Shiller Home Price Indices from Standard & Poor’s. The Case-Shiller does not track home prices in Houston, but

By Peter Ricci Real estate has undergone a radical change in the last 15 years, but perhaps no area of the industry has changed more dramatically than that of how prospective homebuyers search for properties. What used to be

By Peter Ricci Single-family home sales surged in Houston in October, rising 32.7 percent from the year before and pushing the Bayou City’s housing inventory to just a 4.4 month-supply, a level not seen since December 2001. It was

By Peter Ricci Privately-owned housing starts in October rose 3.6 percent from September to an annual rate of 894,000, which is the highest rate since July 2008, according to new numbers from the U.S. Census Bureau. That total was

By Natalie Terchek Fannie Mae’s Economic & Strategic Research Group released a new edition of its Housing Insights survey that examines how the recession affected homeownership and rental markets. Interestingly, even with rents rising, homeownership rates are on a

By Peter Ricci Unless you’ve been living in severe isolation the last couple months, you know all about the so-called “Fiscal Cliff,” the rather dramatic name that the media has given to the latest round of budgetary disputes facing

By Natalie Terchek Real estate company Century 21 is returning to the Super Bowl’s marketing roster for the second year in a row. According to Beverly Thorne, Century 21’s CMO, the company is expected to air a 30-second commercial

By Peter Ricci The Houston Association of Realtors (HAR) has released the results of its Legislative Priorities Survey, an expansive look at how the Houston public feels on a number of housing-related issues at the federal, state and local levels.

By Natalie Terchek An article by CultureMap says Houston arguably has the best overall real estate market in the nation right now. Residentially, sales are active, builders are constructing new houses and the inventory of homes for sale is

By Natalie Terchek Several Houston real estate companies were honored at the Nancy Owens Memorial Foundation luncheon on October 15 at the Westin Galleria for their philanthropic commitment to the foundation. Each donor gave more than $20,000 during the

By Peter Ricci The Realtor Confidence Index from the National Association of Realtors (NAR) faltered a bit in September, with tight home lending standards stalling the index’s momentum. The index had been rising steadily through most of 2012, and

By Peter Ricci Consumer sentiment towards the housing market has been gradually improving in Fannie Mae’s National Housing Surveys, and a new FindLaw survey has found that the situation is improving other notable ways. According to the FindLaw survey, which

By Peter Ricci The National Association of Realtors spends quite a bit of money advocating Realtor issues, and nowhere are its expenses more prominent than in the realm of politics. In 2012 alone, NAR contributed $2.92 million to political

By Peter Ricci Asking prices increased 0.7 percent from September to October in the latest Trulia Price Monitor, a survey of all the listings featured on the real estate syndication site. In addition, prices rose 2.9 percent from October