The housing market has held its own this year — even with higher inflation, higher oil prices, higher mortgage rates, and crazy headlines about AI taking all the jobs. But mortgage rates are right at a key level now and with the Iran conflict entering its 2.0 stage, can housing hold up?  Today’s tra

Coming out of summer recess, California lawmakers will tackle condominium construction defect legislation that has cleared committees and passed one chamber. Assembly Bill 1903 is one of two condo bills introduced this year by state lawmakers. It would change condo construction defect liability rule

The 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act, which went into effect on July 11, includes a host of pro-housing provisions aimed at making housing easier to build and cutting red tape.  The nearly 400-page bill contains provisions aimed at streamlining federal reviews, supporting factory-built housing, expa

J.P. Morgan Asset Management has released its 2026 Defined Contribution (DC) Plan Participant Survey, finding that retirement plan participants — particularly younger workers — increasingly expect employers to provide more guidance and support as they plan for retirement. The biennial survey examine

The 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act is now law, marking what many in the housing industry consider the most significant federal housing legislation in more than three decades. The bipartisan measure aims to increase housing supply by reducing regulatory barriers, streamlining permitting, modernizin

A New Jersey homeowner has filed a lawsuit against Newrez LLC, dba Shellpoint Mortgage Servicing, alleging the company engaged in years of unfair mortgage servicing practices that deprived her of a meaningful opportunity to avoid foreclosure. The complaint, filed in the Superior Court of New Jersey,

According to Aaron Kirman, much of his success in the real estate industry first as a solo agent, then as a team leader and now as a brokerage CEO, has come from keeping his finger on the pulse of the industry and taking a critical approach to his business.  “Life is always an evolution and you don’

Residential construction activity picked up in June, but the gains were concentrated in multifamily, and future supply indicators softened, according to newly released U.S. Census Bureau data.  Privately owned housing starts rose to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of roughly 1.3 million units in J

Union Home Mortgage Corp. (UHM) has acquired AmeriTrust Mortgage Corp. in an asset deal that closed in 45 days, boosting UHM’s exposure to the nonqualified mortgage (non-QM) market. Financial terms were not disclosed. “There have been long-term relationships between some of the senior executives on

Housing starts beating estimates while housing permits are near cycle lows is an odd situation, but I am here to make sense of it and explain where exactly we are in the housing construction cycle. First, we have to always remember that housing starts are a very volatile number with a lot of revisio

RiskSpan has launched a new credit risk model designed for the expanding nonqualified mortgage (non-QM) market, adding to its existing prepayment modeling tools as investors seek more specialized analytics for the asset class. The company announced Friday the general availability of Credit Model 7.1

Homebuilding scale is arriving at the midway point through a structural inflection. The latest evidence arrived Thursday, as Stanley Martin Homes announced it had entered an agreement to acquire Florida-based Holiday Builders, a transaction that will add approximately 1,050 annual home closings, mor

Eight months ago, Greystone Real Estate Capital was just getting started raising money for affordable housing projects. It has now closed its second fund in less than a year, drawing three existing institutional investors and five new ones. Greystone’s latest fund brought in $137 million, pushing th

loanDepot has asked a federal judge to dismiss a lawsuit accusing the lender of violating federal loan originator compensation rules, arguing that mortgage brokerage West Capital Lending (WCL) lacks standing to sue and is improperly trying to use consumer protection laws to pursue a competitive busi

Nearly 15 years after opening its doors in the wake of the financial crisis, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is operating in a markedly different form than it did just a year ago. Since the Trump administration took over at the start of 2025, the agency’s operations have been in limb

Cody Pearce has returned to YES Communities, one of the nation’s largest manufactured housing community operators, as president, effective July 13, 2026, the company announced. Pearce will oversee day-to-day operations at one of the nation’s largest owners and operators of manufactured housing commu

The Beshara Real Estate Team, a RealTrends Verified-ranked team in Marrietta, Georgia, led by principal agent Brenda Beshara, has joined Compass Atlanta after 19 years with Keller Williams, the company announced on Wednesday. Based in East Cobb, the seven-person team serves buyers and sellers across

Homebuilder confidence fell again in July as affordability pressures and economic uncertainty continued to weigh on demand, according to the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB)/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index (HMI) released on Thursday.  According to the index, homebuilder confidence in Ju

The recently passed 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act got a lot of love and attention, as it is supposed to be the first step toward building a lot more homes in America. But as is often the case, what politicians promise can be more hype than reality, and I believe this is another example. My bias i

Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM) endorsements for April showed that the nation’s top brokerages continued to originate federally insured reverse mortgages at higher or similar levels to their pace over the past year. That’s according to data released this week by Reverse Market Insight (RMI) a