In efforts to escape “sky-high real estate prices” and rising costs of living, California residents are favoring Arizona as a top relocation destination behind only Texas.That’s according to a report released Monday by StorageCafe, a national marketplace for storage space and an affiliate of real estate data provider Yardi. The report reviewed U.S. Census Bureau county-to-county migration data between 2013 and 2022 to identify the most popular and profitable moving routes from California to Arizona. The census report collected data from 3.5 million addresses nationwide, including an unspecified number from counties in California and Arizona. StorageCafe’s analysis ranked the 50 most popular moving routes based on “individual move-ins,” referring to one relocation event where an individual household from California establishes a new residence in Arizona. StorageCafe also considered numerical and percentage differences in home and rent prices across counties in both states, homeownership or rental status, per capita income and generational demographics.The report found that more than 630,000 California residents relocated to Arizona over the past decade — an average of 173 new residents per day. Among the top 50 moving routes, 36% of migrating California residents purchased homes during their first year in Arizona. According to StorageCafe, almost all top-ranked routes offered significant savings on home and rental prices, with the highest amount reaching nearly $1 million. Additionally, the report noted that “homes in Arizona cost less than half of what they do in California ($321K vs. $659K), giving people a much better chance at homeownership. The same trend applies to rent, with Arizona apartments being 30% cheaper than in California.”The No. 1 route between the states — and the route for five of the 10 most popular routes —was from Los Angeles County to Maricopa County. Encompassing the Phoenix metro area, Maricopa County experienced almost 8,700 move-ins from Los Angeles alone in 2022, with 43% of newcomers choosing homeownership.Other common starting points for Californians moving to Maricopa County were San Diego County (5,173 movers), Orange County (4,021), Riverside County (3,302) and San Bernardino County (2,649). About 34,000 California migrants relocated to Phoenix in 2022, with technology job opportunities heavily influencing the trend.“[Phoenix] has always been a darling of tech companies, due to its top-notch universities and strong aerospace industry. Naturally, there’s a busy scene of home-grown tech companies, as well as California transplants. In the past few years, companies like Unical Aviation, Sendoso, and HomeLight moved their corporate headquarters from California to Maricopa County,” the report noted. “This trend is further boosting the local tech sector and contributing to the creation of thousands of attractive jobs.”StorageCafe highlights tech and health care as two key drivers behind a consistent number of young professionals moving to the Grand Canyon State. According to census data, millennials (26%) led the migration charge among age groups, followed by Generation Z (20%). Baby boomers (18%), Generation X (14%) and Silent Generation (4%) movers followed as they sought better retirement options.

In a recent episode of its “New Home Insights Podcast,” Dean Wehrli, principal at John Burns Research & Consulting, chats with David Howard, CEO of the National Rental Home Council (NRHC). They discuss how national, state and local housing policies impact the rental market, and they also explore housing policies proposed ahead of the presidential election.Wehrli: You started with the NRHC after the single-family rental and build-to-rent (BTR) markets grew. But it’s become massively bigger since that time too, hasn’t it?Howard: There’s always kind of been a gray area, and that’s really where single-family rental housing has lived. The business of single-family rental housing has been around for decades, but over the past 10 to 12 years, that market has started to take shape as a separate and distinct asset class within the housing ecosystem.Wehrli: There’s some national legislation that could impact larger entities that have become somewhat important in single-family rentals. Can you give us some background and your take?Howard: Housing has come to the forefront of many policy conversations in Washington, D.C., especially after COVID. We’ve seen some federal legislation addressing concerns policymakers have. It’s very appropriate for policymakers here to examine issues of housing supply, affordability and accessibility.Wehrli: Can you explore the two major presidential candidates and their proposed policies that would impact the rental market?Howard: The vice president [Kamala Harris] has spoken eloquently about the need to build more housing and incentivize new construction. The former president [Donald Trump] has also discussed opening up federal lands for new housing development. Success for either candidate would depend on how effectively they can incentivize new housing development.Wehrli: What’s going on in the states that you would look at as an existential threat?Howard: It’s challenging for state policymakers to enact legislation directly impacting housing on the ground, as housing is largely a local matter. The real action is at the regional level, where zoning and approvals happen. But we are seeing some state-level legislation in places like California, Colorado and Minnesota that restricts rental property construction.Wehrli: Can we talk about the legislation that threatens BTR?Howard: In certain Georgia counties, some single-family homes are set aside for rent through specific legislation, though that approach hasn’t spread widely. Many policymakers simply don’t understand BTR and its benefits.Wehrli: Now, let’s talk a little bit about rent control. Do you see a slippery slope for any kind of rent control?Howard: There’s substantial research showing that rent control acts as a disincentive for new development and ongoing investment in housing. This can, over time, create a greater supply shortage.Wehrli: One of the problems with supply in the multifamily world is capital, particularly affordable capital. Are you tracking that?Howard: Yes, access to capital has become more challenging. The cost of capital is now much higher, making it harder for developers to finance new housing. That’s a big part of why single-family rental homes are sometimes more economical to build than multifamily properties.

Onity Group, the recently rebranded parent company of top-10 lender Liberty Reverse Mortgage, posted improved earnings results in the third quarter of the year — with particular attention given to the profitability of its forward and reverse mortgage servicing segments.Onity CEO Glen Messina led the Tuesday morning earnings call by saying that the company recorded its “highest adjusted pretax income and return on equity in the last three years,” which came in at $35 million. Its net income for the quarter was $21 million. It originated $8.5 billion in loans from July through September, up 23% quarter over quarter. Reverse mortgage highlightsOnity chief financial officer Sean O’Neill highlighted the reverse servicing segment’s overall contribution to the company’s profitability.“This quarter’s performance was supported by strong profitability in the reverse business, benefiting from a successful asset management transaction with improvement both quarter over quarter and year over year,” he said.Part of the contribution came from a previously announced acquisition of assets from Mortgage Assets Management LLC, a subsidiary of investment funds managed by Waterfall Asset Management.“The Waterfall reverse asset transaction closed last week,” O’Neill said. “It increases our equity through preferred equity issuance, provides additional liquidity and includes about $55 million of reverse assets which are accretive to our earnings per share.”The company also continues to “capitalize on market cycle opportunities,” he said, which includes its reverse mortgage activity.This is “demonstrated by our selective MSR (mortgage servicing rights) sales above book value this year, all three of which were replenished in the same period by strong originations volume,” he said, “as well as the opportunistic reverse asset transactions we have engaged in since early 2023, two of which were the reverse transaction in September and the Waterfall transaction, both of which helped our successful debt restructuring and provided accretion to net income.”Impact on balance sheetThe company gained $10 million in adjusted reverse servicing pre-tax income. It also added $46 million in liquidity via its reverse mortgage servicing operation.Overall reverse mortgage origination volume also increased quarter over quarter, from $184 million in Q2 to $197 million in Q3.“Reverse [pre-tax income] improved over last quarter to break even driven by improved margin and volume in the reverse correspondent subchannel,” the company reported.As it has in prior quarters, the company emphasized that its full reverse mortgage pipeline as an “integrated reverse originator, servicer and subservicer” is contributing to its overall profitability. Onity has logged $722 million in reverse mortgage originations over the past 12 months, and it maintains a reverse servicing and subservicing portfolio of $22 billion, or roughly 7% of its total book.According to Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM) endorsement data compiled by Reverse Market Insight (RMI), Liberty/Onity is the fourth-largest reverse mortgage lender in the country as measured by endorsements.It endorsed 1,138 HECM loans during the 12 months ending Oct. 31, narrowly staying above Fairway Independent Mortgage Corp. in the top reverse originator rankings maintained by RMI.

The removal of offers of buyer broker compensation from most MLSs across the country — as mandated by the National Association of Realtors’ (NAR) commission lawsuit settlement agreement — was a massive change for real estate agents and brokers. But they aren’t the only housing professionals impacted by these changes.Real estate appraisers also rely on MLS data, including information about buyer broker compensation and seller concessions, in order to accurately appraise properties for homebuyers and lenders. But with the terms of the NAR settlement now in effect, much of that data is no longer available via the MLS.“We’ve taken a step back with data transparency since the NAR lawsuit,” said Ryan Lundquist, a Sacramento, California-based appraiser. “Agent compensation has historically been separated from the concessions field in MLS, but after the NAR lawsuit, the concessions amount field was also removed. “In practical terms, this means appraisers need to reach out to agents to find out if there were any concessions, as opposed to that information being readily available in MLS.”The lack of concession and commission information on the MLS is an inconvenience for appraisers, forcing them to call the agents involved in a comparable transaction. But appraisers say that even prior to the Aug. 17 changes, many considered it best practice to contact an agent and verify this information.“If an appraiser believes a home will make a good comparable, they need to understand all the terms around the sale of the property, so it has always been important to make contact with the real estate agents involved to understand if there were any seller concessions or any terms the appraiser should know about before using the property as a comparable,” said Shawn Telford, the chief appraiser at CoreLogic.Going forward, Telford is expecting even more variation in seller concessions and agent compensation due to the terms of the NAR settlement. To him, this makes phone calls with agents not only a best practice but an absolute imperative.Generally speaking, appraisers say agents are good about taking calls and supplying them with accurate information. But with fewer home sales occurring, Lundquist said he sometimes has to use comps that are much older — and sometimes the agents don’t recall the exact details of a transaction.“Locally, sales volume is down by about 35%, and that effectively means I have 35% fewer comps to choose from,” Lundquist said. “So, the older sales are really going to matter ahead. I certainly don’t want to inflate any value in light of having less access to concessions information and not hearing back from some agents.”Despite having to make more phone calls, appraisers say they have not experienced a massive impact from the settlement-driven business practice changes.“Researching the data, gathering the data and verifying the data have always been an important part of what the appraisers do,” Telford said. “So, whatever has happened with the changes in how real estate agents operate hasn’t really changed the responsibility to the appraiser to understand the terms of the sale.”Kenon Chen, the executive vice president of strategy and growth at Clear Capital, shares a similar view.“We are not really seeing anything needing to be handled differently,” Chen said. “There are some specific markets where concessions are becoming more common or more of a challenge, but we haven’t really seen any impacts yet. But it is still early days.”As he looks ahead, Lundquist is nervous that the future may not be so straightforward. He believes there are a few things appraisers should be keeping a close eye on. This includes identifying any differences between homes where the seller pays for the buyer’s agent’s compensation, versus the ones where the buyer pays out of pocket.“We have to know why some properties could potentially be closing at different price levels, and figure out where market value is in the midst of that,” he said. ”So far, it seems like business as usual in so many transactions, but we have to really critique the comps ahead to understand how the commission — or lack thereof — is affecting the final price.“My observation is this idea has almost seemed offensive to some who work in real estate, but I don’t know how we don’t ask this question if we are serious about accurate valuations. The reality is when laws or practices change, sometimes the questions we ask also change.”

It’s a big week for the U.S. economy as the 2024 election takes place and monetary policymakers are meeting to decide what to do next about interest rates.For mortgage professionals who’ve been dealing with uncertainty of late, more clarity could soon emerge. Mortgage rates have been rising quickly in recent weeks, dashing hopes for growth across the purchase and refinance lending channels.According to HousingWire’s Mortgage Rates Center, the average 30-year conforming rate stood at 6.88% on Tuesday. This figure has jumped 16 basis points (bps) over the past week, 26 bps in the past two weeks and 57 bps since Sept. 18, when the Federal Reserve cut benchmark rates by half a percentage point.The average 15-year conforming rate, meanwhile, grew to 6.55% on Tuesday — up an eye-popping 27 bps in one week. Conditions aren’t expected to improve in the short term, according to HousingWire Lead Analyst Logan Mohtashami.“Mortgage rates are heading higher unless the spreads are fantastic today,” he wrote Tuesday. “The election data will create some wild swings, but the ISM (Institute for Supply Management) service report was a big beat of estimates, which made yields higher this morning after the report was released.”Some help is expected Thursday in the form of another Fed rate cut. According to the CME Group’s FedWatch tool, about 95% of interest rate traders believe the federal funds rate will be lowered by 25 bps. And there is a 77% chance of another 25-bps cut in December, which would bring the overnight rate to a range of 4.25% to 4.5%.“Assuming a 25-basis point cut in November, the September FOMC projections imply one additional quarter-point cut in December,” Sam Williamson, senior economist at First American, said in a statement. “However, additional upside surprises on inflation or employment data could influence the Fed to consider taking the December cut off the table. In contrast, accelerated economic weakness or a rapid slowdown in inflation could prompt the Fed to take a more dovish approach to policy normalization.”While Tuesday is Election Day, the results of the presidential race between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump may not be known immediately. The contest is expected to be extremely close and is likely to be decided by a handful of battleground states, including Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.The presidential race, along with control of the House of Representatives and the Senate, could also factor into interest rate movements in the short term.Survey data released Tuesday by Redfin found that 38% of early voters factored housing affordability into their choice between Harris and Trump. About one-third of respondents believe that rates will decline during a Trump presidency, compared to one-quarter who think the same under Harris. And more respondents believe rates will rise under Harris (32%) versus Trump (28%).ICE Mortgage Technology reported this week that lower interest rates during the third quarter led to higher levels of home equity lending. Home equity withdrawals across both second-lien mortgages and cash-out refinances reached a two-year high mark in Q3 2024.But even with a collective $48 billion in originations for these two categories from July through September, ICE reported that U.S. homeowners are touching only 0.42% of their tappable equity — the amount they can borrower against while keeping a 20% equity stake in the home.The 10-year average extraction rate is 0.92%. Second mortgages are 26% below their historic utilization rate, while cash-out refis are 69% below normal.ICE noted that “elevated interest rates have been a deterrent to homeowner equity utilization in recent quarters, as 30-year mortgage rates climbed at times into the high 7% range, curtailing cash-out refinance activity, and the average introductory rate on second lien home equity lines of credit (HELOCs) rose above 9.5%.”If Fed policymakers continue on their rate-cutting path, however, this could make home equity loan products “more affordable and more attractive,” ICE concluded.“Since the Fed began its latest cycle of rate hikes, the monthly payment needed to withdraw $50K via a HELOC more than doubled, from as low as $167 per month back in March 2022 to $413 in January of this year,” Andy Walden, the company’s vice president of research and analysis, said in a statement.

Credit rating agency Fitch announced this week that its long-term issuer default rating for Finance of America was downgraded to “restricted default” status following its recently publicized debt exchange plan. The rating was then upgraded to “CCC” following the completion of the exchange agreement.Fitch explained its rationale for the whipsaw of ratings by characterizing FOA’s move as a “distressed debt exchange.” Fitch said the exchange “imposes a material reduction in terms compared with the existing contractual terms and is being done to avoid an otherwise likely eventual default.”The reduction in terms are “reflected in the extension of the original maturity of the unsecured debt via the exchange into new notes, and the elimination of substantially all restrictive covenants and events of default on the remaining unsecured notes,” the agency said.Without the exchange agreement, the company would be hampered by “weak operating performance, limited liquidity and [a] highly encumbered balance sheet” that would make it unable to meet the 2025 maturity date of its original agreement. But the exchange agreement, recently amended and claiming a high level of participation, changes the equation, according to Fitch.“The subsequent upgrade of the ratings reflects FOA’s improved financial and operating flexibility following the debt exchange as refinancing risk has been reduced and near-term liquidity needs are limited given the extension of debt maturities to 2026,” Fitch said. “FOA’s ratings remain supported by its established market position within the reverse mortgage sector and experienced senior management team.”But FOA, the reverse mortgage industry’s leading lender, still maintains a “weak liquidity profile” that constrains its ratings, Fitch added. The agency projects that FOA’s earnings will be improved by a stronger interest rate environment.“Fitch believes FOA’s profitability should benefit from a reduction in interest rates, as this will likely drive higher mortgage origination volumes and improve the valuation of the company’s residual investments in its securitizations,” according to its announcement.Additionally, its transition to a “monoline reverse mortgage lender” after closing down its forward mortgage arm will also prove beneficial. Fitch said the transition has had a positive impact on FOA’s operating costs.An FOA spokesperson told HousingWire’s Reverse Mortgage Daily (RMD) that it anticipated these actions from Fitch. FOA is set to announce its third-quarter earnings on Wednesday.“‘The Fitch rating change was expected and, consistent with similar debt exchanges in the market rated by Fitch, FOA’s debt rating has been upgraded to where it was prior to the announcement of the debt exchange support agreement in June 2024,” the spokesperson said.In June, FOA announced the debt exchange agreement that involves new, secured debt that will come due beyond the original 2025 maturity date. It amended that agreement in September by exchanging the current, unsecured notes (due in 2025 with an interest rate of 7.875%) for one of two new bond options. The first offers the same interest rate and is due in 2026 (with a company option to extend into 2027), while the second has a 10% interest rate and comes due in 2029.The news from Fitch follows an announcement from Morningstar DBRS, which affirmed FOA’s previously obtained “good” reverse mortgage originator ranking.

The COVID-19 pandemic impacted the housing market like no event since the 2008 financial crisis, but some of the trends induced by the pandemic are starting to reverse. That’s evident in the annual profile of home buyers and sellers from the National Association of Realtors (NAR), which provides data on dozens of real estate trends.When the pandemic began in the spring of 2020, wealthy residents of urban centers like New York City and San Francisco packed their bags for rural areas and small towns to escape strict lockdowns and find more space for things like home offices. This gave rise to the narrative that city dwellers wouldn’t return and urban centers were dying.Turns out, they weren’t. Between 2017 and 2021, rural areas and small towns had remarkably consistent shares of the home purchase market at about 13% and 22%, respectively. But in 2022, the share of homes bought in rural areas (19%) and small towns (29%) jumped considerably.These purchases came primarily at the expense of the suburbs, where the share of home purchases dropped from a consistent 50% level prior to the pandemic to 39% in 2022. Urban areas also took a hit, falling from 13% to 10%.But in 2024, this trend has largely reversed. The share of home purchases in the suburbs has moved up to 45% while the 16% share in urban centers has actually moved ahead of where it was pre-pandemic.Conversely, the share of purchases in rural areas (14%) and small towns (23%) have largely returned to their pre-pandemic levels.When bad things happen in New York, pundits often say it’s the end of the city. But a lot of the post-pandemic migration among New Yorkers was intracity, meaning that falling rent and home prices in Manhattan were the result of people moving to Brooklyn.While New York is operating much as it was before the pandemic, San Francisco has taken longer to recover because the population is heavily concentrated among tech workers. These companies have been more likely to adopt permanent work-from-home policies.But many major tech companies are now calling workers back to the office, which has led to improved office market conditions in both New York and the Bay Area. Other data in NAR’s report also reflects a return to density. Prior to the pandemic, the median distance that homebuyers migrated from their old house to their new house was consistent at 15 miles. That number popped up to 50 miles in 2022 but has since fallen back to 20 miles. The age of homes purchased is also telling. Between 2009 and 2021, the typical home purchased was built in the early 1990s. In 2022 and 2023, however, the typical home purchased was built in the mid-1980s. This is largely due to a delay in homebuilding caused by supply-line disruptions and shortages of construction materials. Appliances were hard to come by for builders as delays in computer chip deliveries ran rampant and lumber shortages caused prices to skyrocket.Homebuilders are starting to catch up. Today, the typical purchase is for a home built in 1994, or roughly where it was pre-pandemic.

Among voters who cast their ballots by Nov. 1, 38% said that the issue of housing affordability impacted their choice in the presidential contest, according to new survey data released this week by Redfin.The survey was conducted by Ipsos within an extremely narrow time frame of 24 hours on Oct. 31 and Nov. 1. The respondent pool was a nationally representative sample of 1,002 U.S. adults ages 18 and older. Both major party candidates, Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, have discussed their housing plans with varying levels of detail during the election cycle. But the survey results suggest that at least on the core issue of affordability, one candidate has the edge.“Kamala Harris voters were much more likely than Donald Trump voters to say housing affordability factored into their decision: 43% of respondents who already voted for Harris say affordability impacted their pick, compared to 29% of respondents who already voted for Trump,” according to Redfin. Generally, people who have already voted — regardless of their choice of candidate — “were less likely to factor housing affordability into their presidential decision than most other issues we asked about,” the survey explained. “Eleven of the 14 issues listed in the survey were more likely than housing affordability to impact votes.”Voter perceptions of how mortgage rates would be impacted by the election were also tabulated. Roughly one-third of respondents believe that rates will fall under a Trump presidency, compared to about one-quarter of those who think the same under a Harris administration. A larger share of respondents also believe rates will rise under Harris (32%) versus Trump (28%).The campaigns’ general focus on other, more widely discussed national issues like the economy or reproductive rights seemed to hold more sway over voters, the survey results noted.The leading concerns for early voters were the economy (63%), inflation (59%) and protections for democracy (56%).Other leading issues included immigration (55%), health care (52%), crime and safety (47%), abortion access (45%), U.S. involvement in foreign conflicts (41%) freedom of speech (41%), gun violence (40%) and the standing of the U.S. in the global community (38%).Issues suggested to have less of an impact on candidate choice than housing affordability include climate change (36%) and gender-affirming care access (19%).Still, the noise surrounding a national election is often distracting, and housing affordability could play a larger role in local elections, according to the survey results.“Two in five (40%) U.S. residents who have already voted say housing affordability factored into their pick for local races,” Redfin explained. “Crime and safety was the most important consideration, with 50% of early voters saying it impacted their decision on who to vote for. It’s followed by the economy (46%) and inflation (41%), then housing affordability.”Issues regarding housing affordability and facilitating new construction are largely made at the local level. These include policies that impact rental costs and zoning requirements that dictate where and when certain types of homes can be built.

When it comes to what a possible Kamala Harris or Donald Trump victory in the presidential election means for the future of antitrust enforcement in the real estate space, lawyer and industry analyst Rob Hahn may have said it best.“Nobody knows anything,” Hahn wrote in the Nov. 1 edition of his Notorious ROB email newsletter. “Neither Trump nor Harris have made antitrust a big issue in their campaigns. None of the people running have any kind of a real background in antitrust, and only Trump has any kind of a track record.”Although the war between the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the National Association of Realtors (NAR) has been going on for decades, the most recent round of battles began under the Trump administration in 2018. That’s when Congressmen Tom Marino (R-Pa.) and David Cicilline (D-R.I.) sent a letter to the DOJ and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) asking them to “examine competition-related issues in the real estate brokerage industry.” The investigation eventually led to a lawsuit, which was settled in 2020. But NAR did not finalize the settlement until after Joe Biden took office in 2021. And under the Biden administration, the DOJ decided to withdraw from the settlement, leading to the most recent round of lawsuits and appeals.Additionally, an article published by the New York Law Journal found that the FTC’s and DOJ’s antitrust divisions have roughly doubled the average number of complaints seeking to enjoin transactions filed each year under Biden, compared to filings with the agency under the Trump administration.Trump’s track record shows that he has generally been more pro-business than other administrations. This has led to speculation that under a second Trump term, many of the real estate industry’s antitrust concerns would go away, while a Harris presidency would result in a continuation of the status quo. But industry analysts and attorneys are not so sure.While the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) does not deal with antitrust issues, former CFPB deputy enforcement director Jeff Ehrlich believes that, generally speaking, a second Trump administration will be more aggressive in enforcement than many expect.“In 2020, the last full year of the previous Trump Administration, the Bureau brought 48 enforcement actions; so far this year, it has brought only 21,” Ehrlich wrote in an email. He went on to note that during the Trump administration, the bureau “brought some pretty aggressive cases, including in the housing space.“ It filed suit against nonbank lender Townstone Financial for alleged violations of the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA) through discrimination against prospective borrowers. It also settled a mortgage servicing case against Mr. Cooper for $73 million in redress and a $1.5 million penalty. ”If history is any guide, a second Trump Administration might not be as friendly to the industry as many expect,” Erlich wrote.For Hahn, it was Trump’s selection of Sen. JD Vance as his running mate which has made things a bit murkier.Vance has voiced his support for FTC Chair Lina Khan, stating at a policy conference in February that he looks “at Lina Kahn as one of the few people in the Biden administration that I actually think is doing a pretty good job and that sort of sets me apart from most of my Republican colleagues.”Vance added that one of the things he most appreciates about Khan’s approach is that “she recognized there has to be sort of a broader understanding of how we think about competition in the marketplace.”And Hahn isn’t the only who believes Vance’s selection has thrown off expectations. The New York Law Journal wrote that “Vance has seemingly positioned himself to play a significant role in antitrust enforcement and to pick up where Trump’s previous administration left off.”“At a minimum, a second Trump presidency would likely continue the pro-enforcement stance from his first four years. If Trump entrusts Vance with significant control over competition policy, their administration may look surprisingly similar to the current, potentially including the appointment of someone with a similar populist agenda to Khan to the helm of the FTC,” the article states.Marx Sterbcow, the managing attorney at Sterbcow Law Group, also doesn’t buy into the narrative that a Trump victory would mean a “return to normal” for the real estate industry.“In the past, when the Trump administration entered into the settlement with NAR, things had kind of cooled down,” Sterbcow said. “You didn’t have things like active antitrust litigation going on, or the jury verdict in Missouri, so there was a lot more normalcy in the industry and everything for the most part was very stable and static. “Obviously, that has changed dramatically. The industry right now is fakakta because you effectively have a hodgepodge of confusion for consumers across the United States, and it is only facilitating a lot more antitrust issues for companies and consumers.”While Sterbcow acknowledges Trump’s pro-business track record, he does not believe a second Trump administration will stand by if consumers are blatantly being harmed or taken advantage of.“It is not like consumer protection is going to go away,” Sterbcow said. “We saw in the previous Trump administration where they went after things that harm consumers. I think in the case of the commission rules, they will let it play out and allow market forces to take control, which could create another set of issues.”Sterbcow is anticipating that the industry will undergo further significant changes in the next 24 months. But he also feels that if these changes are making things worse for consumers, the DOJ’s antitrust division will take further action.Hahn shares a similar view, supported by what he feels is Trump’s focus on decreasing the cost of living, which he believes will translate into a focus on housing. Hahn said if the Trump administration homes in on housing, antitrust pressure on the industry could continue if things like agent commissions are perceived as inflated or a potential roadblock to homeownership.In the same way industry experts believe a second Trump administration won’t be completely lax on enforcement and antitrust regulations, they are also skeptical that a Harris presidency would mean a continuation of the path set forward by the Biden administration. Fueling some of this skepticism is that the vice president’s stance on antitrust is unclear.Harris has previously announced her intentions, if elected, to pass a federal ban on price gouging. She has aims to take on Big Pharma and corporate landlords, which some believe are indications that she well may continue the Biden administration’s antitrust agenda. Some have noted that a Harris victory may wipe the slate clean when it comes to antitrust, but there does not appear to be any evidence to suggest she will completely change course from what the Biden administration has pursued.Sterbcow, for one, not only sees a continuation but a ramping up of antitrust enforcement.“I think there could be a lot more,” Sterbcow said. “I think you’ll see a lot more fair lending and fair housing enforcement, especially on the price of real estate commissions, and that is something no one in the industry wants because we have no data on how things will play out with the current policy changes in place.”

Elevated mortgage rates, sky-high home prices, tight credit and stagnant wages have all contributed to homebuyers getting older. Newly released data from the annual profile of home buyers and sellers by the National Association of Realtors (NAR) shows just how dramatically this trend has manifested since the financial crisis of 2008.The median age of homebuyers has hit a new all-time high, with first-time buyers at 38 years old and repeat buyers at a whopping 61 years old. Together, the median age of all homebuyers sits at 56.“The U.S. housing market is split into two groups: first-time buyers struggling to enter the market and current homeowners buying with cash,” Jessica Lautz, NAR’s deputy chief economist and vice president of research, said in a statement accompanying the report.“First-time buyers face high home prices, high mortgage interest rates and limited inventory, making them a decade older with significantly higher incomes than previous generations of buyers. Meanwhile, current homeowners can more easily make housing trades using built-up housing equity for cash purchases or large down payments on dream homes.”The trendline is startling. In 2002 — around the same time that the underlying causes of the 2008 financial crisis took root — there was significantly less separation in median age between first-time buyers (31) and repeat buyers (41).While the median age of buyers gradually increased over the course of two decades, the COVID-19 pandemic sped it up. Since 2020, the median age of buyers rose by 11 years, including a spike of 5 years among repeat buyers, who now make up 76% of the market — also an all-time high.The data is part of NAR’s sprawling annual report that includes a wealth of data on buyers, sellers and real estate agents across a wide range of demographics.While single women have bought a higher percentage of homes than single men since NAR began tracking the data in 1981, that gap has widened in the past two years. The share of homes bought by single women jumped from 17% to 20% and the share bought by single men fell from 10% to 6%.This movement is more dramatic among first-time buyers, with the share of homes bought by single women rising from 19% in 2022 to 24% now, while the share bought by single men dropped from 18% to 12%.Homebuyers are increasingly childless. In 2012, 59% of homebuyers had no children under the age of 18. That number now sits at 73%. The median income of homebuyers has also shot up, with first-time buyers earning a median of $97,000 while repeat buyers are making $114,300.

Reverse mortgage industry performance metrics have been trading gains and losses for several months now, but a more favorable interest rate environment and optimism about the possible trajectory of business in 2025 have arrived alongside some generally positive news for October.Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM) endorsements increased by 11.1% from September to October, with 2,392 loans endorsed last month, according to data compiled by Reverse Market Insight (RMI).Meanwhile, HECM-backed Securities (HMBS) issuance posted its largest figure since September 2023, increasing by $98 million during the month for a total of $598 million in October. There were 78 pools issued, one fewer than in September. This is according to Ginnie Mae data and private sources compiled by New View Advisors.Endorsement volumeWhen asked about the primary source for the spike, Jon McCue — RMI’s director of client relations — pointed to a previously predicted rise in Federal Housing Administration (FHA) case number assignments.“As always, we turn to case number assignments to answer this question,” he said. “We predicted a rise in endorsements given the sharp comeback in case numbers shown between June to July, and with another increase in August, we should most likely see another increase next month if this holds true.”Geographically, volume gains took place across the 10 tracked regions. But the gains were not as pronounced as they might have been if all else were equal, McCue explained.“Given that all the regions were up, as you’d expect with a nice increase month over month in endorsements, [geographic activity is] not [telling us] much,” he said. “There is one exception to this rule, though, and that is the Southeast/Caribbean region was the only region that was down on the month. “The only big difference there came from the hurricanes, so you would have to suspect that those storms had a major impact on volumes, but otherwise we saw fairly strong gains across the board.”Once again in October, Mutual of Omaha Mortgage outperformed Finance of America, with the former overtaking the latter atop the rankings for year-to-date totals. When asked whether this is a sign that Mutual of Omaha is overtaking FOA, McCue said he wasn’t totally sure.“These are both strong companies that have their own strengths,” he said. “It is tough to say that one is taking over another for a top spot with the numbers so close. It is looking like a neck-and-neck race going into the finish line of 2024, though. I would say that we as an industry are lucky to have two strong companies like this leading the way for others, and hopefully their momentum continues into and through 2025.”Many analysts are predicting that the Federal Reserve will move to modestly cut rates again on Thursday. When asked if this could have a beneficial impact on the reverse industry, McCue pointed to rates rising again after the previous Fed rate cut. A bigger impact could come from another major event taking place this week.“It didn’t have the impact that so many people thought it would,” McCue said of the rate cut. “However, one thing that is potentially bigger for rates is what happens in the election. That may have more of an impact than any rate cuts by the Fed. It truly is a waiting game, and election years are always interesting.”HMBS issuanceHMBS issuance saw a larger bounce in October when compared to other recent months, but that has not changed the overall calculus. Issuance is still at historically low levels, and the final tally for 2024 is likely to be significantly lower compared to the past few years.“HMBS issuance set a record in 2022, with nearly $14 billion issued,” New View said in its commentary accompanying the data. “Total issuance for 2023 was approximately $6.5 billion. 2024 total issuance through October totals $4.9 billion — $579 million lower than at this time last year and $7.6 billion lower than at this time in 2022.”But in terms of what has moved the proverbial needle, Mutual of Omaha’s total issuance jumped strikingly — from $75 million in September to $161 million in October.The biggest issuers for the month remained relatively stable. FOA stayed in the top spot with $170 million (versus $151 million in September), followed by Mutual of Omaha, Longbridge Financial ($126 million, up from $105 million) and PHH Mortgage Corp. ($88 million, down from $108 million). “Issuer 42,” the designation given to the former portfolio held by Reverse Mortgage Funding (RMF), again issued no pools.Not only did last month’s gain push Mutual of Omaha to No. 1 in the year-to-date-totals, but its additional activity was given as a key reason for the industry’s overall monthly gain.“The uptick in October HMBS issuance volume is primarily attributed to Mutual of Omaha’s $88 million in tail pool issuance,” said Michael McCully, partner at New View Advisors.Tails are not from new loans, New View said, but do represent new amounts lent and consistent of “subsequent participations.” But overall, tail issuance is “burning out,” McCully said.“Average monthly tail issuance in 2017 was $235 million; 2024 year to date is $174 million,” he said.One potential spot to keep an eye on remains Ginnie Mae’s planned HMBS 2.0 program.“If HMBS 2.0 is implemented, expect 2025 HMBS volume to increase over 2024, as many loans will be securitized twice,” McCully explained.

In a week expected to mark the close of a divided race for the U.S. presidency, mortgage loan officers are standing by the motto of, “Let’s control what we can control.“As they navigate the anxieties of homebuyers and market shifts, they told HousingWire they’re encouraging clients to move forward with their applications rather than waiting on campaign promises.With the election nearly behind them, they are hopeful for less uncertainty ahead, especially after an uptick in mortgage rates that runs contradictory to the Federal Reserve‘s rate cut in September. Most expect that as the political dust settles, rates could stabilize or trend downward, regardless of who occupies the White House — Donald Trump or Kamala Harris. “The mood amongst our loan officers is a cautious excitement to get the election behind us finally,” said Todd Bitter, chief sales officer at UMortgage, which has about 300 sponsored loan officers across 39 active branches. “Most seem to think that, regardless of the winner, business will return to normal since the general homebuying public seems on edge.”Bitter said this election reminds him of Y2K, in reference to a computer programming shortcut that was expected to cause issues when the year changed from 1999 to 2000. Bitter said that, “Wednesday, we will all wake up with little difference in our lives. Of course, depending on your views, it matters who wins, but little will change overall. The divisiveness that politics have become has created something from nothing.”The political toxicity, however, has added some volatility to mortgage rates. After the Fed slashed 50 basis points to its benchmark rate in September, the 30-year fixed mortgage rate went down to 6.25%, according to HousingWire’s Mortgage Rates Center. But as the race advanced, rates picked up, reaching 6.86% on Monday. (The Fed is meeting again this week and is widely expected to announce a cut of 25 bps.)“We’ve seen an uptick in the 10-year Treasury yield that has been as low as 3.6%, and now we’re up to 4.25%. The speculation is that at least some of the drivers here are market participants thinking that the odds of a Trump administration, and particularly the odds of a red wave, have increased quite considerably, and that would potentially be putting upward pressure on rates,” Mike Fratantoni, senior vice president and chief economist for the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA), said last week during a conference in Denver.The explanation is that there would be larger deficits under a Trump administration based on estimates from the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, which compared Trump’s and Harris’s economic proposals. Per the MBA, the 30-year fixed rate is projected to decline from an average of 6.3% in 2024 to 5.9% in 2025. “I do believe that we are in a downward trend for rates,” said Kevin Leibowitz, CEO of New York-based broker shop Grayton Mortgage. “I do believe in the invisible hand — either party can say what they want, put policies into place or remove regulations, and the market will do what the market will do.”Leibowitz’s general advice to his clients is to “lock a mortgage rate and move on,” since “timing any financial market is difficult.”All in all, mortgage professionals don’t think Trump or Harris have offered a “panacea” for the housing market’s main struggle — the lack of supply.“My advice is business as usual,” Bitter said. “The $25,000 Kamala is offering will never get through Congress, so waiting is going to cost more in house appreciation.”Shannon Hoff, a senior mortgage adviser at American Pacific Mortgage — a lender with 1,685 sponsored LOs and 426 active branches — said that polls show both candidates “neck and neck,” so it’s unclear whether the election results will be known on Tuesday or Wednesday.“I know that many articles are saying that under Trump, rates will be higher, but businesses will be healthier. Under Harris, they say the opposite will happen. However, a big problem homeowners have is financial and economic noise,” Hoff said.“There is a bunch of noise, so some people are deciding to do nothing. As an LO, it is my job to educate my clients so that paralysis is not the issue. Homeownership has many more benefits than renting. It is just finding the individual ‘why’ for each potential client.” 

Global credit rating agency Morningstar DBRS last week assigned a “good” rating to reverse mortgage industry leader Finance of America (FOA), confirming the ranking the company was assigned this past summer ahead of its earnings call this week.The rating is officially classified as “MOR RVO2” by Morningstar. The agency once more noted the recent business history of FOA — including the abandonment of its forward mortgage business and its acquisition of American Advisors Group (AAG). In its previous assessment, Morningstar mentioned the relative stability of FOA’s senior leadership team as a partial justification for the rating.“Morningstar DBRS previously confirmed its MOR RVO2 residential reverse mortgage originator ranking for FAR,” the company said. “The trend on the ranking remains stable.”The company also mentioned the distribution channels for its reverse mortgage products, including Home Equity Conversion Mortgages (HECMs) as well as its proprietary HomeSafe loans.“FAR is licensed to operate in all 50 states, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico,” the analysis said. “In 2023, the company originated more than 8,700 reverse mortgages totaling more than $1.6 billion, and, as of March 31, 2024, FAR originated approximately 1,600 reverse mortgages, totaling more than $348 million.”Prior to the August 2024 ranking, FOA last received the MOR RVO2 ranking from DBRS Morningstar in mid-August 2023.FOA is preparing to reveal its Q3 2024 earnings to investors in a conference call on Wednesday with its executive leadership team. In the company’s second-quarter earnings report, FOA remained in the red but with reduced losses alongside growth in loan volume.The company is preparing for Q3 earnings following an announcement last week of changes to the HomeSafe Second product, which is now available in four additional states (for a total of 10) to borrowers ages 55 and older.The company also reduced the interest rate on the product from 9.99% to 9.49%. Interest rates on second-lien loans tend to be higher when compared to first liens, reflecting the higher amount of risk to the lender.

As candidates in the upcoming presidential election offer strategies to address a national housing crisis, there is an urgent need for new solutions for the housing shortage in rural America. The current set of federal policies often takes a “one size fits all” approach based on urban and suburban market economics. Consequently, one in four rural households cannot afford the home they live in, let alone a move up the ladder of the American dream.There are plenty of examples where federal housing policy is stacked against rural homeowners and renters. The most egregious is also the nation’s largest federal housing support, the home mortgage interest deduction. Last year, the US spent $35 billion on this subsidy to help homeowners to pay less in taxes.   Few rural families qualify for the deduction, not because they make too much money or their home values are rising, but perversely because their incomes and home prices are too low to qualify. Worse yet, the nation spent more last year on mortgage deduction than it did on nearly all other federal housing programs combined – including public housing, rural rentals, Section 8 vouchers and others designed to assist families with lower incomes. By limiting rural homeowners’ access to the mortgage deduction and other programs, we are making it harder for them to maintain and improve their property. This has worsened the “value gap” for rural residents, which occurs when the home’s appraised value is less than what it takes to make the property habitable and is a frequent obstacle to homeownership for rural renters. The misalignment extends to the rental market, too. In rural America, multifamily rental properties are often smaller and have many fewer units than urban and suburban projects. However, most federal multifamily financing programs favor scale and volume. There are steps that federal policymakers can take to address the misalignment, including:1. Craft tax policy that accounts for the economics of rural America’s housing marketsWith the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 set to expire at the end of 2025, the next Administration and Congress have an opportunity to better address rural America’s housing needs as part of the next major tax overhaul. Specifically, policymakers should: Designate rural and Tribal areas as Difficult to Develop Areas (DDAs). Doing so will increase the allowable equity cap for Low Income Housing Tax Credit (LITHC) projects in DDAs, in turn helping to ensure that the smaller developments common in rural America are able to cash flow.Pass the bipartisan Neighborhood Homes Investment Act (NHIA) to establish a federal tax credit to finance the construction and/or preservation of affordable, owner-occupied housing in select underserved markets, including rural communities, and help to close the “value gap.”2. Empower the Department of Agriculture (USDA) to more forcefully shape the next generation of housing policyThough the USDA already administers multibillion dollar programs vital to affordably housing rural Americans, the agency is largely ignored in the housing platforms that have been put forth by the leading presidential candidates. To strengthen and expand these crucial programs, policymakers should:Meaningfully invest in the Section 515 multifamily rental program, which is losing thousands of units each year and has not seen new construction in well over a decade. Scale the Section 502 direct home loan program, which has provided loans to over 2 million low-income rural borrowers since inception. The program not only promotes affordable homeownership and bolsters local real estate markets, it also costs the government less per household than an equivalent rent subsidy. Ensure that new funds to encourage housing supply target rural communities. The Biden-Harris Administration and the Harris-Walz campaign have proposed a multibillion-dollar Housing Innovation Fund to incentivize communities to expand housing supply, to be administered by the Department of Housing and Urban Development.  USDA should co-administer any such program with the responsibility to ensure that one quarter of the funding reaches rural communities in proportion to rural America’s share of the nation’s housing stock.3. Streamline federal housing programs and grow rural communities’ capacity to use themBroadly speaking, rural communities have smaller governments, fewer well-resourced organizations, and less philanthropic investment. As a result, most rural communities simply have less capacity to successfully navigate the nuanced and complicated maze of federal housing policy, in turn making it harder for them to fully capitalize on these crucial programs. To address this, policymakers should:Streamline the administration of federal housing programs, mindful that every additional layer of financing, application process, and cash match requirement reduces the likelihood that a rural community will be able to fully benefit from the program.Enact a multibillion-dollar Rural Partnership and Prosperity Program, modeled on the bipartisan legislation in the House and Senate, to invest directly in the capacity of the mission-driven organizations that are doing the hard work of creating and preserving affordable housing in rural communities nationwide.Despite popular narratives that imply otherwise, rural communities are vibrant, innovative, and worthy of investment. But they are also underserved by most federal housing policies. For these communities to reach their full potential, policymakers must take the tools, policies and infrastructure we already have and refine them so that they can do justice to the millions of people who call them home. David Lipsetz is the President and CEO of the Housing Assistance Council.This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of HousingWire’s editorial department and its owners.To contact the editor responsible for this piece: zeb@hwmedia.com

The 2024 general election in the United States is on Tuesday, and will decide the balance of power between the two major political parties in our system of government. At the top of the ballot, the presidential race between Democratic nominee Vice President Kamala Harris and Republican nominee and former President Donald Trump pits two very different governance philosophies against each other, with their own implications for housing in America.But control over both the House of Representatives and the Senate will also be decided, and depending on who wins the White House, those races will also determine the legislative path forward for all of the policy priorities of both parties, including housing.With only 24 hours remaining until the election, here are some of the essential details HousingWire has reported on related to the upcoming election.The presidential raceAt the beginning of the year, housing broke out into a major issue of the campaign when President Joe Biden detailed a housing policy agenda in his State of the Union address. The president’s annual speech to a joint session of Congress is a highly visible policy proposal with a national television and online audience, and ongoing discontent from voters regarding the high cost of housing bubbled over into the mainstream political arena from that point forward.Vice President Kamala Harris takes her official portrait Thursday, March 4, 2021, in the South Court Auditorium in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building at the White House. (Official White House Photo by Lawrence Jackson)" data-image-caption="Kamala Harris" data-medium-file="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_245b9622-9a84-4478-b2d0-a1b022714ed8.jpg?w=240" data-large-file="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_245b9622-9a84-4478-b2d0-a1b022714ed8.jpg?w=819" tabindex="0" role="button" src="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_245b9622-9a84-4478-b2d0-a1b022714ed8.jpg?w=819" alt="Vice President Kamala Harris takes her official portrait Thursday, March 4, 2021, in the South Court Auditorium in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building at the White House. (Official White House Photo by Lawrence Jackson)" class="wp-image-434944" style="width:200px" srcset="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_245b9622-9a84-4478-b2d0-a1b022714ed8.jpg 819w, https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_245b9622-9a84-4478-b2d0-a1b022714ed8.jpg?resize=120,150 120w, https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_245b9622-9a84-4478-b2d0-a1b022714ed8.jpg?resize=240,300 240w, https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_245b9622-9a84-4478-b2d0-a1b022714ed8.jpg?resize=768,960 768w" sizes="(max-width: 819px) 100vw, 819px" />Kamala HarrisLawmakers would follow the president’s lead over the next several months, outlining their own proposed bills seeking to address high housing costs for both prospective homebuyers and renters, and the ongoing costs associated with insurance. Democrats sought to build on some of what the president brought attention to in his speech, while Republicans aimed to offer counterpoints. Housing came up briefly in the first presidential debate of the year, but that would prove to be a turning point in the election cycle for a whole other reason the next month.Following what was often characterized as a “disastrous” debate performance in June, President Biden announced in July that he was dropping out of the race and threw his support behind Vice President Harris.Harris then kicked off her presidential campaign under a crunched timeline prior to the Democratic National Convention, consolidating support from the majority of the party’s delegates to secure the presidential nomination, selecting Gov. Tim Walz (Minn.) as her running mate, and hitting the campaign trail.Harris came right out of the gate talking about housing, and has gone on to present a detailed housing policy proposal, beginning with a focus on housing supply and a need to spur construction of additional homes.Gov. Tim Walz. Photo by Gage Skidmore via Wikimedia Commons." data-image-caption="Tim Walz" data-medium-file="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_2994e957-e5e5-40ca-8b44-63dc96ff6cd3.jpg?w=246" data-large-file="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_2994e957-e5e5-40ca-8b44-63dc96ff6cd3.jpg?w=839" tabindex="0" role="button" src="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_2994e957-e5e5-40ca-8b44-63dc96ff6cd3.jpg?w=839" alt="Gov. Tim Walz. Photo by Gage Skidmore via Wikimedia Commons." class="wp-image-484682" style="width:200px" srcset="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_2994e957-e5e5-40ca-8b44-63dc96ff6cd3.jpg 839w, https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_2994e957-e5e5-40ca-8b44-63dc96ff6cd3.jpg?resize=123,150 123w, https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_2994e957-e5e5-40ca-8b44-63dc96ff6cd3.jpg?resize=246,300 246w, https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_2994e957-e5e5-40ca-8b44-63dc96ff6cd3.jpg?resize=768,937 768w" sizes="(max-width: 839px) 100vw, 839px" />Tim Walz“As president, I will work in partnership with industry to build the housing we need, both to rent and to buy,” Harris said at a campaign event in August. “We will take down barriers and cut red tape, including at the state and local levels.“Her plan calls for the construction of 3 million new homes, an expansion of the low-income housing tax credits (LIHTC) program, and a series of favorable tax programs for homebuilders that construct affordable homes. She also unveiled a plan that would offer $25,000 in downpayment assistance for first-time homebuyers, and publicly stated that “some” corporate landlords are responsible for rent increases that are exacerbating affordability issues.On the Republican side, former President Donald Trump has most consistently aimed to tie the issue of housing shortages and lack of affordability to immigration. Trump contends that an influx of undocumented immigrants serves to drive demand — and prices — higher, creating challenges for citizens in securing an affordable place to live.Former Trump White House officials and industry trade groups have also said they expect he would attempt to sharply reduce the regulatory costs in mortgage and real estate, and many expect him to try to remove Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac from conservatorship.Different perspectivesOne of the more substantive housing debates to emerge this election cycle was between the vice presidential candidates from their only debate in October. Walz and Republican vice presidential nominee Sen. JD Vance (Ohio) each emphasized the different elements of their running mates’ housing plans, with Walz speaking a lot about a housing shortage and the need to view housing as less of an outright commodity, while Vance echoed Trump’s key talking point.Official Senate portrait of Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio)." data-image-caption="JD Vance" data-medium-file="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_df0f6292-74d2-43cd-ae91-67d6bd8ffdf0.jpg?w=240" data-large-file="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_df0f6292-74d2-43cd-ae91-67d6bd8ffdf0.jpg?w=819" tabindex="0" role="button" src="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_df0f6292-74d2-43cd-ae91-67d6bd8ffdf0.jpg?w=819" alt="Official Senate portrait of Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio)." class="wp-image-484685" style="width:200px" srcset="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_df0f6292-74d2-43cd-ae91-67d6bd8ffdf0.jpg 819w, https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_df0f6292-74d2-43cd-ae91-67d6bd8ffdf0.jpg?resize=120,150 120w, https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_df0f6292-74d2-43cd-ae91-67d6bd8ffdf0.jpg?resize=240,300 240w, https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_df0f6292-74d2-43cd-ae91-67d6bd8ffdf0.jpg?resize=768,960 768w" sizes="(max-width: 819px) 100vw, 819px" />JD Vance“25 million illegal aliens competing with Americans for scarce homes is one of the most significant drivers of home prices in the country,” Vance said during the debate. “It’s why we have massive increases in home prices that have happened right alongside massive increases in illegal alien populations under Kamala Harris’s leadership.”It’s difficult to determine how much of a motivator housing will be in getting voters to the polls. Most scientific polls characterize the presidential race as a dead heat, with leads between the two candidates often falling within margins of error. There are signs that housing is an issue on the minds of Gen Z voters, particularly as it relates to affordability.Vance has spoken a lot in the past about issues he sees with the housing situation in the U.S., with some of his populist-driven rhetoric drawing comparisons to the way Democrats typically talk about institutional activity in housing from policy experts. Trump has also signaled certain intentions that could impact U.S. housing, including a desire to have more influence at the Federal Reserve and a repeated intention to privatize the government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs).The conservative think tank the Heritage Foundation also published a potential policy playbook for a second Trump administration called “Project 2025,” which featured a series of specific housing proposals bylined by former Trump-era HUD Secretary Ben Carson, but the campaign and candidate have distanced themselves from it and insisted that it will not have bearing on sought policy priorities.The official portrait of U.S. President Donald Trump." data-image-caption="Donald Trump" data-medium-file="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_767e420f-e239-4000-856b-aab3647084b1.jpg?w=300" data-large-file="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_767e420f-e239-4000-856b-aab3647084b1.jpg?w=620" tabindex="0" role="button" src="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_767e420f-e239-4000-856b-aab3647084b1.jpg?w=620" alt="The official portrait of U.S. President Donald Trump." class="wp-image-433698" style="width:200px" srcset="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_767e420f-e239-4000-856b-aab3647084b1.jpg 620w, https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_767e420f-e239-4000-856b-aab3647084b1.jpg?resize=150,150 150w, https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241105/16/original_767e420f-e239-4000-856b-aab3647084b1.jpg?resize=300,300 300w" sizes="(max-width: 620px) 100vw, 620px" />Donald TrumpDemocrats disagree, and have seized on the proposals to cast Republican policy priorities broadly as “extreme” when compared to the desires of most voters.There has been surprisingly little movement in the polls for the presidential race since Harris entered the fray, despite gaffes from either side, an assassination attempt on Trump and other controversies. Each candidate has different strengths according to voters, with Trump generally having an advantage on the issues of immigration and the economy while Harris is seen as the better choice on reproductive health and defending democracy.When it comes to housing, however, a recent Bloomberg poll indicated that Americans see Harris as potentially more beneficial in addressing housing costs. Real estate and mortgage pros, however, seem to favor Trump.CongressIn the races for the legislative branch — in which all 435 House seats and 33 Senate seats are up for grabs — housing has a part in the conversation but to a lesser degree than the presidential race.Among Democrats, members of the House and Senate have introduced several potential bills for debate in either chamber aimed at spurring construction and expanding affordability. Republicans have been more focused on lowering regulatory burdens, in September introducing a bill that would expand the oversight of federal housing programs, make changes to loan officer compensation for the origination of small-dollar mortgages, and create additional counseling requirements for homebuyers.Around the same time, House and Senate Democrats introduced an ambitious $30 billion housing bill that would construct and preserve affordable housing, and would seek to create a new national housing development authority to provide an “alternative to a market dominated by corporations and investors with deep pockets.”It would also repeal the Faircloth Amendment, which imposed limitations on the number of affordable housing units the government could build. It has prevented any net increase in public housing stock from the number of units maintained by the government as of Oct. 1, 1999, requiring public housing agencies to either remove units or consolidate existing ones to limit the number of units the government has on its books.It’s unclear how voters will break on these issues in the congressional races. Pollsters and political operatives seem to agree that Democrats will have a harder time maintaining a majority in the Senate due to high-profile retirements and endangered incumbents, but the House is harder to predict due to the extremely narrow divisions in that chamber.But at least on the housing front, there is more agreement between the political parties on these issues than some others driving forward the election debate.In California, rent control is on the ballot yet again. If passed, Proposition 33 would repeal a state law that prevents local governments from enacting rent increase limits on most single-family homes and on housing built after 1995. Supporters say the legislation will give municipal leaders a way to help reduce extreme housing costs. Opponents say it would discourage new construction, exacerbating existing issues.

The hardest position to take in analyzing the housing market is one that is contrarian and bullish. When everyone knows that the housing market is sluggish and weak, but the data shows surprising strength. That’s where we are right now. Home sales are significantly better than they were last year at this time. No one else is reporting it yet, because the traditional data takes so long to reach the headlines. This week, we count 14% more homes in the contract pending stage now than a year ago. These are homes that will generally close in November and December. Another tricky part of communicating this news is that home sales aren’t suddenly great. This isn’t a strong market; it’s just better than last year. Last year was weak as mortgage rates were hitting 8%. But they’re back up to 7% now, so maybe this strength is fleeting and will evaporate as we close out the year. Meanwhile, national home price signals had another positive week this week. Inventory is past peak for the year, so the momentum looks to keep the trends in a positive direction for now. Let’s take a look at the data as we’re already in November 2024.Inventory drops againThere are 736,000 single-family homes unsold on the market in the U.S. That’s a couple thousand fewer than last week, and down again from the peak two weeks ago. The unsold supply of homes on the market has now passed its peak for 2024. The inventory peak came a month earlier than in 2023. There are 29.8% more homes on the market than last year. Remember in September we were at 40% more homes on the market and now we’re under 30%. That’s because in the fourth quarter 2023, the market was grinding to a halt. Mortgage rates were super high and inventory was building. The market is different now. The market peaked with almost 740,000 single-family homes unsold a few weeks ago. That was about 6% more than we had anticipated earlier in the year. We’d modeled that the peak would be more like 700k. That difference can be attributed to mortgage rates staying higher for longer through September. Higher rates create more inventory. One reason inventory can’t drop quickly this year is because so much of the country, like the midwest and northeast, don’t have many homes on the market. Places like Chicago have barely more homes unsold than during the pandemic. It’s hard for inventory in Chicago to fall for the holidays where there are already no homes on the market. It remains to be seen if this recent spike in the cost of money is going to reverse the supply trend. For whatever reason, the trend seems to be holding now. New listings riseThere were just under 61,000 new listings unsold this week. That’s just a touch more than last week, but 17% more than a year ago. When you include the 9,400 immediate sales, the total is 13% more sellers than a year ago. Last year at this time, the market was in deep retrenchment — both buyers and sellers were walking away. So, the new listings volume last year was low and dropping. The market feels marginally healthier now.While it’s late in the year, you could say that the weekly new listings are in the “old normal” range now. Many years of the last decade there would be 60,000 to70,000 new listings in a week in November. We’ll see if this trend continues, because consistently more sellers would signal a transition to new market dynamics.Maybe this year’s strong showing is just a reflection of the country finally getting some mellow weather. It’s really just one week. Sellers could dip again next week. But maybe it’s an early sign that we’re witnessing the slow erosion of the mortgage lock-in effect? Are home owners tired of waiting on the sidelines for conditions to improve? Home sales show a jumpOn the demand side, the market showed a jump in new transactions just as it did a jump in new listings this week. We counted 63,000 new contracts started for single-family homes this week. This may be evidence that the activity is a bit of noise, with some fluctuations caused by hurricanes. People had deals to do, but they got delayed for a few weeks. The key with the newly pending home sales data is that we always keep our eyes open for conditions where sellers are climbing but buyers are not. This week, both sellers and buyers both accelerated. There are now 354,000 single-family homes in the contract pending stage.One thing that I find fascinating is that even though mortgage rates have jumped back up close to 7%, we haven’t yet seen a slowdown in the sales volume. As rates rise and home prices stay elevated, mortgage payments for a typical buyer have inched back up close to the highs from a year ago. Affordability is getting worse right now, but we haven’t yet seen a correlated slow down in buyers. I don’t have a great explanation for why that is. Maybe buyers are just slow to respond to fast changes in mortgage markets.Here’s another data point that emerges when we examine the pending home sales. In August the withdrawal rate — the listings that never got offers, are not pending, and are no longer for sale — was higher than previous years. It was one reason that inventory didn’t grow more quickly. If a seller is not happy with the market conditions and chooses not to sell, inventory goes down. In August, we saw more withdrawals, but It no longer appears to be that way. Withdrawals were climbing in the fourth quarter 2022 and 2023, but they’re not climbing now. Home prices are resilientI’ve shared recently how the median price of homes in the U.S. are staying resilient right now. That surprised me given the obviously weak first three quarters of the year. The chart below is the median price of the newly pending contracts for single-family homes, and you can see that resiliency. That price is $389,900 again this week. That’s unchanged from a week ago and is running 5% to 6% above home prices a year ago. Home price strength has been the most surprising development in the housing market this year. We’re looking at the national average, of course. There are some regions where home prices are down. There are local markets where home prices have declined for the last two years and haven’t found a bottom yet. Some of these markets I’ve looked for signals of price upturns and don’t find them.  Price cuts dipPrice cuts dipped again this week. Fewer home sellers found the need to reduce their asking prices. The market is almost at the lowest level in two years in November. Some 39.4% of the homes on he market have taken a price cut from their original list price. Next week, we could have fewer price cuts than either of the last two years. We use price reductions as a leading indicator for future home sales. I see a market that stayed frozen for much more of 2024 than anyone expected. Buyers waited on the side lines for cheaper money. That mortgage rate dip finally emerged in September. That was enough to motivate some homebuyers. We didn’t see that motivation when rates were at 6.5%, but we did when rates fell closer to 6%. Rolling into 2025, we’re currently positioned for weakness to start the year. What if we start 2025 with mortgage rates over 7%? I think that’s the key. It’s wild how quickly the sentiment can change. As of now, 2024 looks like home prices are holding firm nationally and inventory is peaked for the year, but what if economic news or the election drives mortgage rates back over 7%? Mike Simonsen is the founder of Altos Research.

The Real Brokerage‘s expansion trend has continued with another major affiliation. The digital brokerage platform announced on Monday the addition of Amerivest Realty, a Florida-based brokerage, adding 400 agents across Florida, Colorado, Minnesota and Wisconsin to Real’s platform. The move broadens Real’s service capabilities and aligns the brokerage with industry consolidation trends.Amerivest brings experienced agents and a suite of technology and education tools — covering marketing, business management, customer relationship management (CRM) and document management solutions — that will integrate into Real’s platform. The affiliation is designed to better position Real as a leader in the digital brokerage space.Real said that Amerivest founder and president Joe Ballarino is a key factor in the move, praising his industry expertise and tech-forward approach.“Joe’s commitment to technology and education equips agents with the tools to elevate client service,” Real President Sharran Srivatsaa said in a statement. “This aligns seamlessly with Real’s mission of innovation and excellence, and we are excited to support Joe and his team as they continue to push boundaries in the industry.”Ballarino began his career in 1994 with Winfield Associates, Amerivest’s predecessor, taking ownership of Amerivest in 2016. He has held multiple leadership roles with the Florida Association of Realtors. He helped to launch Amerivest’s transaction management platform, Form Simplicity, as well as a cloud-based CRM for Florida Realtors.The move to Real marks a new chapter for Ballarino. “Amerivest was built on the foundation of empowering agents with the tools and technology to succeed,” he said. “Joining Real allows us to take our platform even further, providing agents with unparalleled resources while tapping into Real’s collaborative culture.”The affiliation is part of Real’s strategic expansion efforts, following the additions of the Grant Johnson Group in Minneapolis and other firms in recent months. Agent support and retention are also key parts of Real’s strategy. At the RISE conference on Oct. 22, Real unveiled three new products — Leo CoPilot, Leo for Clients and Real Wallet — to highlight its commitment to innovation and growth. It has further expansion plans for 2025.

The HousingWire award spotlight series highlights the individuals and organizations that have been recognized through our Editors’ Choice Awards. Nominations for HousingWire’s 2025 Tech100 Award are open now through December 16, 2024. Click here to nominate a tech organization.As technology continues to rapidly reshape nearly every aspect of real estate and mortgage, HousingWire’s Tech100 award has become an industry staple, spotlighting the companies driving this transformation each year. To catch up on the latest in housing tech, we reached out to leaders from some of HousingWire’s 2024 Tech100 winning organizations to learn more about the projects they’ve been working on since earning their place on the prestigious list. Take a look below to see the latest from last year’s winning organizations who answered the question: What new products or projects has your company taken on since its last TECH100 win? “Kiavi launched a new construction financing product. This product leverages Kiavi’s technology and data platform to offer competitively priced, transparent, and reliable capital to real estate developers looking to rebuild outdated houses or build new homes on vacant lots. As far as we know, Kiavi is now the only major, fully digitized, end-to-end platform for real estate investors to finance new construction projects.” — Arvind Mohan is CEO of Kiavi“In October, we introduced Floify Verify, a native VOIE service that allows lenders and brokers to verify borrower data without having to manage additional vendors or leave the point of sale workflow. The solution covers 90% of the U.S. workforce and reduces verification costs by 60%-80% over legacy methods. And, because it’s powered by Argyle, reports are eligible for GSE representations and warranties relief.” — Sofia Rossato, President and General Manager of Floify“We’ve doubled down on our AI technology. In real estate, helping people build wealth starts with data and analysis. We’ve developed innovative technology that uses computer vision to analyze property conditions, providing valuable insights to homeowners nationwide. Whether they choose to leverage Revive’s services or not, our mission is to empower better real estate decisions through data.” — Dalip Jaggi, Co-founder and COO, Revive Real Estate“We’ve continued incorporating AI into our tools and growing our existing AI-specific tool specifically for real estate agents. We leaned in this year on not just adding AI for the sake of adding AI, but leveraging what we’ve learned and how quickly this space has changed from a technological perspective. We are adding enhancements to tools where they make sense, make an impact, and ultimately remove friction from our agents’ day-to-day.”— Alisande Heriyanto, VP of Product and Tech Support at The Corcoran Group“Winnow has increased its regulatory coverage by an astounding 33%, taking our total number of individual requirements from 60,000 to 80,000. We also announced Winnow AI, our groundbreaking AI-powered search assistant that provides lightning-fast answers to common legal questions. In addition, we’ve focused on several improvements to our core product, with enhancements to survey export, dashboard, and defined terms. In coming releases, Winnow will see improvements to notifications, the addition of bill language, and the ability to build surveys based on a past date.” — Chris Hilliard , CEO of Winnow SolutionsNominate your organization for HousingWire’s 2025 Tech100 award before nominations close December 16th, 2024.

Home prices have remained firm over the last two months, even with higher mortgage rates and inventory data. Our weekly tracker data is created to look ahead of the traditional monthly reports such as Case Shiller and the NAR existing home sales report, and what I have seen over the past few weeks has shocked me. I want to show you how the data changed with mortgage rates heading toward 6% so the next time this happens, we have a better idea of what to expect in the housing market. Deviation In the dataI aim to determine what level of mortgage rates we need to change the demand curve, which can also change the pricing curve in housing data. I have long believed that it’s rare in the U.S. after 1996 to have existing home sales trend below 4 million. We have had a few months in which we have gotten below this level, but nothing too drastic. Back on Nov. 9, 2022, I showed how housing dynamics shifted by tracking forward-looking data. This podcast video is a tutorial on how to track this and why the 2023 housing price-crash people got it wrong because they have no working models. To this date, these principles still apply. Let’s take a look at what looks different today versus the past two years.Pending contracts First, we must realize that we are working with the third calendar year of the lowest home sales ever recorded, once you adjust that number to the workforce. It’s not like we have underwater mortgages or credit being tight either — this was the biggest crash ever and sales are still low. This means we have a low bar of sales to work from because mortgage rates have been trending between 6%-8% for two years with rising prices, and we aren’t crashing in sales lower from these levels. So, when we look at the contract data, mortgage rates heading down toward 6% firmed the data up and the data is still showing a deviation from the levels we see from 2022 and 2023. This means the bottom-end sales are finding a firm base to work from. What I take from this is that we need 6% mortgage rates to grow sales with some sustainability. It won’t be spectacular, but we can grow and sustain higher sales rates at that level. We don’t need 3%, 4%, or even 5% mortgage rates, but just heading toward 6% and staying there can work. If you want to see sales growth with some kick, you need sub-6% mortgage rates with duration, but since I can’t even forecast those levels yet, I am not going in that direction until the labor market breaks or the spreads get much better. I recently talked about this on CNBC. This is something to consider in the future. Every year, wages grow, more households are formed and if mortgage rates fall, it should create another positive demand curve data line of over 12 weeks. However, if mortgage rates can stay between 5.75%-6.25% for 12 months, it can sustain a higher sales level from the data we have seen since the end of 2022.Purchase application dataLast week, purchase application data had a positive 5% week-to-week print and was up 10% year over year. However, remember that October had a shallow bar, so take the entire month showing positive year-over-year growth with some context. If I took the whole month of October, which was positive every week on a year-over-year basis, we averaged about 7.4% growth from last year.Let’s look at how this data line has acted so far this year.When mortgage rates were running higher earlier in the year (between 6.75%-7.50%), this is what the purchase application data looked like:14 negative prints2 flat prints2 positive printsSince mortgage rates started falling in mid-June, here’s what purchase applications looked like:12 positive prints 5 negative prints1 flat print3 straight positive year-over-year growth printsWith mortgage rates up again, here is where we are:2 negative prints1 positive weekly printHere we can see a clear positive, forward-looking data line with mortgage rates heading toward 6%, and now this makes two times since late 2022 this has happened where demand gets better for over 12 weeks. I talked about the recent data being different in the HousingWire Daily podcast last week. But it isn’t just demand but also pricing. Pricing dataRegarding price-cut data, many fake housing experts took information from other sources and didn’t know how to explain it correctly. This has been one of the most entertaining things to watch in 2024, by the way. They misread the price cut percentage and rising inventory data to mean that national home prices had to fall a lot this year. But we never had a proper deep negative pricing curve data line this year, and it’s November now. However, this year, mortgage rates heading toward 6% facilitated the price cut percentage data to go lower earlier this year than in 2022 and 2023 data. Nothing is too dramatic here, but as you can see with the pending contact data, we have a rate variable that can change the data line even with rising housing inventory. There were many years of housing data in the early to mid-1980s and mid to late 1990s, and even from 2000 to 2005, where we have seen rising inventory and sales. You can have rising inventory, increasing sales and rising prices. The price-cut percentage data is crucial if you know how to read it properly, and as you can see below, the price cut percentage data has slowed down recently.What is shocking is that our weekly new pending price median data has firmed up even in a seasonally soft pricing period, especially now with higher inventory data. As you can see below, there is an apparent deviation from the 2022 and 2023 data. This is why my forecast for 2024 at 2.33% and home-price growth is at risk. If mortgage rates stayed near 6%, you wouldn’t have to be a rocket scientist to guess what the data line shows.Weekly data linesI am focusing on the deviation data in this weekend’s tracker, which is different than what we usually do; this is a quick look at the traditional data we show.The weekly housing inventory did decline slightly. This is a back-to-back week of a minor decline in inventory. We have seen good growth in active listings data this year, so for those who said inventory can’t ever grow with higher rates, 2024 hopefully changed your mind. Inventory fell from 736,014 to 735,718.New listings data had a slight increase this week from 60,066 to 60,819.The positive story for 2024 so far is that inventory has grown. I wanted this to happen in 2023, but it happened too late to make a material change. However, for 2024, we’ve seen inventory growth and no new severe listing data from the new listings data in 2024. To give you some perspective on what stressed new listings look like, compare the 60,819 new listings data this week versus the data we saw this week during these years:2009: 280,4002010: 353,4572011: 352,030As I often say, we had different credit markets back then, so stop dancing with a ghost.10-year yield and mortgage ratesMy 2024 forecast included:A range for mortgage rates between 7.25%-5.75%A range for the 10-year yield between 4.25%-3.21%I will keep this as simple as possible. I have talked about this 4.40% line in the sand on the 10-year yield for some time now. If this level breaks higher, we have broken the downtrend in the 10-year yield that started on Oct. 16, 2023, when it was at 5%. We have a lot happening this week, so let’s watch this. If you’re confused about the bond market action on Jobs Friday, this article goes into my take on that. Mortgage spreadsMortgage spreads had a good day on Friday, preventing pricing from worsening. However, the bigger story has been that the spreads getting better this year have been a positive for housing. If we had no improvement this year, rates could not only be higher today but all year. The spreads have gotten worse recently but are still better than last year.The week ahead: All bets are off Between the election and the Fed meetings this week, all bets are off the table on anything being normal. I will be on the HousingWire Daily podcast three times this week to explain what is happening. Monday’s podcast will try to explain what is going on with the 10-year yield and mortgage rates. For this week, the 4.40% level for bond yields is key; closing above that level and getting follow-through bond selling can be problematic for housing. However, try to ignore the intraday moves—they can be wild near critical technical levels. Good luck to everyone this week.

Vetted by HousingWire  |  Our editors independently review the products we recommend. When you buy through our links, we may earn a commission.Whether you’re looking to start a career in real estate, already have one or are involved in real estate transactions, you may find yourself wondering about industry terminology and job titles. The industry acronyms alone look like alphabet soup. So, let’s start with the basics: What is a real estate broker vs. an agent? To answer that, we’ll take a deep dive into the differences between the many types of real estate professionals, including a real estate agent and a real estate broker. Real estate agents and real estate brokers are both licensed real estate professionals who can assist buyers and sellers, but you should be aware of some key differences and state-specific distinctions. Let’s dive in!SummaryWhat is a real estate agent?What does a real estate agent do?How do real estate agents get paid?Types of real estate agentsHow to become a real estate agentWhat is a real estate broker?What does a real estate broker do?Why become a real estate broker?Types of real estate brokersHow to become a real estate brokerThe full picture: Real estate broker vs. agentFAQsWhat is a real estate agent?A real estate agent is a licensed professional who represents buyers or sellers in real estate transactions. Though most commonly thought of for residential deals, real estate agents can also help people buy, sell or rent commercial properties, land and more.There are multiple types of agents — more on that below — but the common thread is that to become an agent, each professional must fulfill licensing requirements in accordance with their state. Much like lawyers needing to take a separate bar exam in each state they wish to practice in, real estate agents’ training and licensing requirements vary by state.PRO TIPYou may see the terms “real estate agent” and “Realtor” used interchangeably. While a Realtor is indeed an agent, the term doesn’t work both ways. To be a Realtor, an agent must be a member of the National Association of Realtors® (NAR). To become a NAR member, licensed real estate agents must join a local NAR association and pay annual dues.What does a real estate agent do?A real estate agent’s tasks will vary depending on which side of the transaction they are on. This section gives you a broad overview of their most common roles.Arguably, one of the most important functions of a real estate agent is to guide and be a subject matter expert to clients through the buying and selling processes. Put simply, a good agent is a sherpa who knows every step of the journey and expertly leads their client up the path. That can include being a housing market expert and advising clients on the best times to list or buy a home; having referrals handy for inspections, repairs, staging and photography; understanding the mortgage origination process; and more.Real estate agents are also intermediaries between buyers and sellers, ensuring that their clients are well-represented in negotiations and that any concerns that arise during the transaction are addressed. Direct communication between buyer and seller is rare, and in many cases, can backfire. Agents serve as a safe middleman to keep things moving forward in a professional manner.Also top of the list, agents are marketers. A top-notch real estate agent knows exactly how to market a home listing to get the right eyes on it. This includes — but is not limited to — posting to the MLS, hosting open houses and getting creative with social media.Last but not least, real estate agents prepare documents such as closing documents, purchase agreements, and leases while ensuring that the transaction is in compliance with local laws and their client’s terms are met. An agent may also be present at closings to review closing documents and help guide their client through the final steps.This is far from an exhaustive list of all that agents do, but the common thread is this: Agents serve as experts and guides in real estate transactions to get their clients the best possible outcomes.How do real estate agents get paid?The simple answer is that real estate agents are paid on commission, typically a percentage of the property’s sale price. In the average residential transaction, commissions are usually split between the buyer’s agent and the seller’s agent, with the seller typically paying both commissions.However, if you’ve been paying attention to the news over the past few months, you know this question has been top of mind across the industry. The NAR Settlement, which resulted from a class action lawsuit, brought real estate commissions into the spotlight.Unfortunately, it also resulted in the circulation of misinformation about commissions. While several changes went into effect in August following the settlement, commissions remained negotiable, as they always have been.Types of real estate agentsAs you’ve likely gathered, there are multiple types of real estate agents. An agent can play many roles but typically stick to one role in a single transaction to avoid conflict of interest. For example, it would be rare for an agent to be both the listing agent and buyer’s agent for the same transaction (what’s called dual agency). However, it does happen, and we cover that below, as well as the various types of brokers. Here are brief descriptions of each type of real estate agent:Listing agent: The listing agent represents the seller. Their responsibilities include listing the property on the MLS, marketing the property and negotiating offers with potential buyers.Buyer’s agent: The buyer’s agent represents the buyer. They assist buyers throughout the home search, negotiate the purchase price and guide them through the closing process.Dual or transactional agent: As mentioned above, these situations are rare, but a dual or transactional agent represents both the buyer and the seller in the same transaction. This can create conflicts of interest, and real estate agents generally shy away from this.Referral agent: A referral agent is a real estate agent who refers clients to other agents in exchange for a referral fee. This is a common practice in the real estate industry, especially for agents who specialize in certain types of properties or markets.Commercial real estate agent: Commercial real estate agents specialize in transactions involving commercial properties, such as office buildings, retail stores, and industrial warehouses.How to become a real estate agentThe path to becoming a real estate agent varies by state, so your natural first step is to research your state’s requirements. Factors like minimum age, education, and background checks differ by state. Generally, you need to be a U.S. citizen or legal resident and be 18 years of age or older. No matter where you’re looking to work, to become a real estate agent, you must complete a prelicensing course from an accredited real estate licensing school prior to sitting (and passing!) your state’s real estate license exam.Enroll in and complete a prelicensing course approved by your state’s real estate commission. This course covers real estate law, contracts, finance and ethics. The required number of hours varies by state. Find our state-specific guides here to learn how many hours of education you need to complete to become licensed in your state. We highly recommend The CE Shop. With training courses for all 50 states and easily accessible online courses, The CE Shop is a value-packed resource for agents nationwide. To learn more and find a list of other helpful accredited real estate schools, check out the links, below.Check out The CE ShopRelated articles The CE Shop Review: Features, pricing and pros & cons The best online real estate school for every learning style & budget The next official step is to take the exam, but don’t forget to complete some practice exams first! After you pass your state licensing exam, real estate agent hopefuls submit an application for a license to their state’s real estate regulatory organization. This application will require several documents and a fee, which again, varies by state. Once your application is approved, the state then mails the real estate license to you.Now, it’s time to join a brokerage. Depending on the brokerage, agents may pay anywhere from $25-$500 per month to be a part of the brokerage. With that in mind, it’s a good practice to interview multiple brokerages before deciding where to land.Top real estate broker Ashley Harwood included some great questions to ask potential brokerages in her article about working part-time as an agent here. After agents have partnered with a brokerage, it’s time to get to work. But keep in mind that licenses will need to be renewed. For license renewal courses and continuing education, read Best real estate continuing education schools for quick and easy license renewal.Related articles Free real estate practice exam + 7 study hacks to ace the real estate exam The best real estate companies to work for in 2024 (+ beyond) What is a real estate broker?Unlike real estate agents, real estate brokers are licensed to work independently and run their own real estate businesses. With this additional licensing, they can employ agents to work for them and receive a portion of the commissions that those agents earn.Apart from that, their job function is almost identical. They can help people buy and sell properties, and guide clients through the real estate process. If you’ve ever been on the consumer side of a real estate transaction, you may have worked with a broker instead of an agent and never known it.PRO TIPIn some states, such as North Carolina and Washington, the first level of real estate licensing is called “broker.” These states are called “broker-only” states, meaning the entry-level license is a broker license. The next level of licensing is usually managing broker.What does a real estate broker do?In addition to all of the typical tasks of an agent, real estate brokers will often supervise other agents and they will often oversee their own firm or brokerage. Like agents, there are multiple types of brokers, and their responsibilities will vary based on their job titles.For example, a designated broker is someone who owns a real estate firm and oversees business activities, such as hiring and managing other brokers, agents and office staff.We’ll dive into the types of brokers and their responsibilities below, but the main takeaway is that brokers can perform all of the functions of a real estate agent with the added element of managing or employing other agents. Why become a real estate broker?The answer to this question depends on your motivations, but for many, there are two main reasons: Financial opportunities and the entrepreneurial aspect.Brokers receive a cut of the commissions their agents bring in, in addition to a greater portion — if not the entirety — of the commissions from their own transactions. There are several ways that brokers can structure commissions with agents.Straight commission splits are the most typical, and as the name implies, involve the agent splitting a portion of the commission with their broker. These splits are entirely up to the broker and could be anything from 90/10 to 60/40 and so on. Brokers may take into account the seniority of the agent and the hands-on help required when structuring the split. Top-producing agents who join a brokerage often have the advantage here, and will often get a 90/10 split.Apart from the financial aspect, agents may opt to become brokers out of a desire to be their own boss and mentor others. For those with an entrepreneurial drive, owning a firm may seem enticing. As with any business, though, the more you oversee, the more you’re responsible for. Brokers are often legally liable for the actions of agents working under them.Related articles Aceable Agent Review: features, pricing, pros & cons Real estate exam prep: The ultimate guide to acing your state’s real estate exam Types of real estate brokersLike real estate agents, brokers can specialize in different areas. We’ve outlined the main types below. Keep in mind that licensing for these roles may vary by state. Designated broker: The highest level of broker, a designated broker, is responsible for the actions of all licensed agents working under them. They oversee all real estate activities and ensure compliance with state laws and regulations. They can still interact with individual clients but often focus on managing the overall business. Managing broker: Think of this role as a mid-level manager. A managing broker reports directly to the designated broker and manages various aspects of the real estate firm, such as working with clients, training new agents and managing work schedules.Associate broker: An associate broker works under the supervision of a designated or managing broker. They can perform all the duties of a real estate agent, but they may also have additional supervisory responsibilities within the brokerage.Broker-in-charge or Principal broker: These roles most closely align with designated brokers. The two terms are often used interchangeably and refer to the licensed broker responsible for the overall operation of a real estate brokerage. You’ll more commonly see the title “broker-in-charge” in broker-only states.How to become a real estate brokerThe first step is to become and work as a real estate agent. As with obtaining a real estate license, the requirements for brokers vary by state. To help build skillsets and heighten their reputation, broker hopefuls can earn certifications in addition to the required real estate license.After gaining experience as a real estate agent, it’s time to take the state-approved real estate broker course. This course is more detailed than the real estate agent course, particularly on topics of contracts, ethics, insurance and taxes. Upon completion of the course and passing the exam, real estate agents are ready to be licensed as brokers. Much like an agent, brokers must actively continue their education and renew their licenses to stay current. For a list of the best real estate schools to complete your broker licensing course, check out our article here.We highly recommend The CE Shop for the convenience and speed of their broker licensing courses. The CE Shop offers real estate broker licensing courses in all 50 states, plus Washington DC, and boasts excellent value and course content, plus the convenience of online studies to level up your career. Check out The CE ShopRelated articles California real estate license renewal: How to get it done fast Best real estate continuing education schools for quick and easy license renewal in 2024 The full picture: Real estate broker vs. agentGoing back to the original question, “What is the difference between real estate agents vs. brokers?” The simple answer is that brokers have the ability to do everything a real estate agent does while also managing or employing agents to work under them. Put simply, think of real estate agents as individual contributors and brokers as managers/owners.Both roles have pros and cons. For brokers, the obvious pro is increased financial gain from additional streams of commission. However, with that comes the increased risk, as the broker assumes liability for any legal issues that may arise with agents working under them. The inverse is true for agents. Real estate agents get the benefit of guidance and mentorship under a brokerage, but it comes at the cost of a portion of their commission.Related articles How to get listings in real estate — 11 proven strategies for 2024 How to be a successful real estate agent (without going broke) FAQsWhat is the income difference between a broker vs. agent?There’s no simple answer to this, as neither position is typically salaried, and commission splits vary.According to NAR, the average annual income for a real estate agent in the United States is $46,014 (as of January 2024), but the range typically falls between $44,951 and $58,528.Brokers’ income varies depending on whether they still sell. According to NAR, the median income for a selling broker is $105,900, and for a broker who does not engage in sales, it is $91,900.How long does it take to become an agent vs. a broker?Many real estate training sites estimate about a four to six month average on the road to becoming a real estate agent. However, with a structured training course and ample time dedication, agent-hopefuls could cut this time down to just a few weeks.For those who are already licensed agents, it can take up to three years to become a broker. Most states require that brokers have two years of experience as a practicing real estate agent. Add this to the time it takes to complete training hours and pass the exam.Can real estate agents work independently?The short answer is no. Real estate agents must partner with a brokerage and work under a licensed real estate broker.Related articles 5 best online real estate schools in Texas for 2024 Image two" data-medium-file="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241102/16/original_df5a0d0a-6241-4467-a354-2626457d1cf8.png?w=300" data-large-file="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241102/16/original_df5a0d0a-6241-4467-a354-2626457d1cf8.png?w=1024" tabindex="0" role="button" /> 7 best online real estate schools in Florida (FL) for 2024 Los Angeles California skyline at night" data-image-caption="" data-medium-file="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241102/16/original_de22c397-a8eb-42fc-9ee1-36a1fb13190c.png?w=300" data-large-file="https://img.chime.me/image/fs/chimeblog/20241102/16/original_de22c397-a8eb-42fc-9ee1-36a1fb13190c.png?w=1024" tabindex="0" role="button" /> 5 best online real estate schools in California for 2024 jQuery(document).ready(function($) { $('.vetted-accordion-header').click(function() { var content = $(this).next('.vetted-accordion-content'); if (content.hasClass('active')) { // Collapse the section if it's already active content.removeClass('active').css('max-height', '0'); $(this).removeClass('open-toggle'); // Remove class from header } else { // Expand the clicked section content.addClass('active').css('max-height', content.prop('scrollHeight') + 'px'); $(this).addClass('open-toggle'); // Add class to header } });});