CHM Blog

Housing high notes reach new crescendo across markets

When Wicked’s Elphaba sang the song “Defying Gravity” in the musical, she must have been talking about home prices. Realtor’s Melissa Dittmann Tracey reports that the majority of housing markets tracked by NAR posted median home price increases in the first quarter, with many hitting all-time highs.

“Homeowners are the clear winners in the housing market, continuing to experience strong appreciation as home prices remain on a steady upward march nationwide,” says Tracey, who adds that some markets, like Syracuse, NY, are still seeing double-digit gains. Syracuse has evidently seen the largest home price increase in the country over the past year—up about 18% annually, according to the NAR in its latest quarterly report.

NAR Chief Economist Lawrence Yun says, “Most metro markets continue to set new record highs for home prices,” noting that more than 80% of metro areas saw home price increases in the first quarter.

Compared to a year ago, median home pricing for existing single-family homes rose 3.4% to $402,300. The year before? Nearly 5%, indicating that while prices are still climbing, the pace of growth has slowed somewhat.

Look to the Northeast for some of the highest home price increases over the past year, followed by the Midwest and the West. The South, while experiencing the largest share of existing-home sales in the first quarter, posted the slowest annual price appreciation.

As for price declines, nearly 17% of the 228 markets tracked—or 38—saw home prices go down in the first quarter. “That’s up from 11% in the fourth quarter of 2024, according to NAR’s latest housing report,” says Tracey, but adds that Yun says there ’s no reason for alarm. Think Boise, Las Vegas, Salt Lake City, San Francisco and Seattle. Yun says with solid job growth, prices would probably recover. Austin, San Antonio, Huntsville, Myrtle Beach, Raleigh and many Florida markets are areas that could rebound fairly quickly, he says.

In case you're wondering, housing inventory is growing—mostly in Southern markets from an uptick in new-home construction. But Yun reminds us that prices have risen so much over recent years that homeowners are still selling at a profit. And that with so much new job creation and people from other states moving into places like Florida and Texas, he thinks it’s going to be a short-phased decline.

Whatever happened to distress sales like foreclosures, short sales and mortgage defaults? Yun says they continue to be at historically low levels. “It’s still a very good time to be a homeowner,” Yun says. “About 88 million homeowners across the country are consistently smiling because they’re seeing large home price gains. This is a sizable wealth gain at a time when the stock market has undergone some volatility.”

Realtor, TBWS

How Rates Move:

Conventional and Government (FHA and VA) lenders set their rates based on the pricing of Mortgage-Backed Securities (MBS) which are traded in real time, all day in the bond market. This means rates or loan fees (mortgage pricing) moves throughout the day, being affected by a variety of economic or political events. When MBS pricing goes up, mortgage rates or pricing generally goes down. When they fall, mortgage pricing goes up. Tracking these securities real-time is critical. For more information about the rate market, contact me directly. I'm among few mortgage professionals who have access to live trading screens during market hours.

Rates Currently Trending: Neutral

Mortgage rates are under pressure today. The MBS market worsened by -5 bps last week. This was not enough to increase mortgage rates or fees. The market experienced high volatility last week.

This Week's Rate Forecast: Neutral

Three Things: These are the three areas that have the greatest ability to impact rates this week. 1) Tariffs, 2) Inflation and 3) Retail Sales.

1) Tariffs: Trade and Tariff negotiations/announcements/expectations will continue to be the main driving force for rates. The weekend negotiations with China led to a 90 day "cool off" period. Where China lowered tariffs on U.S. goods from 125% down to 10% and the U.S. lowered their tariffs of 145% down to 30%.

2) Inflation: We will get both CPI and PPI this week. Headline CPI is expected to flip from -0.1% all the way up to 0.3%. The hotter this data is, the worse it will be for rates.

3) Retail Sales: This is where the "rubber meets the road" between the extremely soft consumer survey data versus hard/actual data.

The Fed: Here is this week's schedule with the focus on Thursday's Fed Chair Powell speech:

05/12 Kugler

05/14 Waller, Jefferson, Daly

05/15 Powell, Barr

05/16 Barkin, Daly

This Week's Potential Volatility: High

This morning markets started under very heavy pressure but some of that has already backed off. Volatility has started at moderate to high levels and will likely be high this week.

Bottom Line:

If you are looking for the risks and benefits of locking your interest rate in today or floating your loan rate, contact your mortgage professional to discuss it with them.

Richard Sardella has been actively managing and providing services in the mortgage industry for over 30 years. Richard serves on the board of directors as President of Colorado Home Mortgages Inc.

All information furnished has been forwarded to you and is provided by thetbwsgroup only for informational purposes. Forecasting shall be considered as events which may be expected but not guaranteed. Neither the forwarding party and/or company nor thetbwsgroup assume any responsibility to any person who relies on information or forecasting contained in this report and disclaims all liability in respect to decisions or actions, or lack thereof based on any or all of the contents of this report.

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