By Peter Ricci First-time homebuyers have always played an integral role in the housing market, but the latest HousingPulse Survey from Campbell/Inside Mortgage Finance has found that they may be missing out on the housing recovery. After surveying 2,500

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 New single-family home sales increased 17.2 percent year-over-year in October, according to the latest joint report from the U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Although sales were down 0.3 percent from September to October,

By Peter Ricci Referrals, it’s safe to say, are the lifeblood of a real estate agent’s career. Though networking and prospecting are invaluable for generating leads, it is through stellar service, and the referrals that such service generates, that

By Peter Ricci The 2013 Dodge Construction Green Outlook report, McGraw-Hill’s oft-cited study of the green building market, is predicting great things for green building in the U.S., estimating that the market will more than triple in the next

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 Last week in our continuing series on NAR’s 2012 Profile of Home Buyers and Sellers, we looked at the demographics of 2012’s homebuyers and how they searched for their future homes, and now, in our next

By Peter Ricci We all get a kick out of walking around our neighborhoods and surveying everyone’s holiday decorations, and indeed, few things looks nicer than a brightly-lit, tastefully-decorated home in the wintry months. But what about homes you

By Peter Ricci National home values rose 1.1 percent from September to October in the latest Zillow Home Value Index, which is the largest monthly increase since August 2005 and the 12th consecutive month of value increases for the

By Peter Ricci Well, it’s here – after gorging on delicious helpings of turkey and potatoes on Thanksgiving, it’s now time to splurge on televisions, clothing, DVDs and various home furnishings on Black Friday, the official start of the

By Peter Ricci So, today is Thanksgiving, the notorious Turkey Day when we satisfy our prodigious appetites with turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, casseroles of the corn and green bean variety, and rolls – not to mention ice cream, pies,

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 The National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index, the nation’s most reputable measure of homebuilder confidence, rose five points in November, increasing the overall index to 46, its highest point since May of 2006. The

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 As a sales-based industry, real estate depends on clients, and as sales personnel, real estate agents benefit when they have a solid grasp of who those clients are and why they are interested in what they are

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