Search results '2011/08'
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Buying now cheaper than renting
16Aug

Buying is now cheaper than renting in most U.S. cities

August 16, 2011 02:15PM

Purchasing a home is now cheaper than renting in most U.S. cities, thanks to drops in home prices, rock-bottom interest rates and increased demand for rental properties, CNN reported.

Buying made more economic sense than renting in 74 percent of the country's 50 largest cities in July, according to data from Trulia.com, with renting winning out in only 12 percent of cities, including New York. In the remaining 14 percent of cities, the costs of buying and renting were similar.

"It's a personal decision, of course. But if you have a steady job and you are planning to stay for seven years or more and have enough cash to put 20 percent down and enough left over for seven or eight months of expenses, you're better off buying in most places," said Daisy Kong, a spokesperson for Trulia.com.

At one end, Las Vegas was most obviously a buyer's market in July, with prices having plunged 59 percent from their 2006 peak. The median price of a two-bedroom property was $60,000.

New York remains quite clearly a renter's market despite the average asking rent hitting $2,980 per month, the highest of all the U.S. markets. To buy a two-bedroom home in New York costs an average of $1.3 million. [CNN]
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Foreclosures Nosedive
11Aug

Here's a bit of seemingly good news for the Fort Lauderdale real estate market: foreclosure throughout the county plummeted by more than fifty percent during the month of July when compared to the numbers of 2010. Good news, right? Unfortunately, it's not quite as nice as it may initially seem.

The dramatic drop in Fort Lauderdale real estate foreclosures and beyond is actually a result of the turmoil that's currently happening around the nation, namely loan modification efforts, state level foreclosure prevention and mortgage payment help for those who are currently unemployed. So in reality, the situation still isn't quite as rosy as we'd like it to be.

Of course you could interpret this in an entirely different way: the slow pace means there's a lot more assistance out there if you own a piece of Fort Lauderdale real estate and are having trouble making those mortgage payments. Remember that lenders generally prefer to work out a suitable payment plan with you instead of having to deal with the hassle of a default so it pays to contact them if you're in such a situation.

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