Home values continue to take it on the chin. The latest update of the S&P/Case-Shiller home price index for 20 large metro areas says values fell 3.3 percent over the 12 months through February. Not great for homeowners to be sure, but soft home prices are in fact creating an interesting conundrum for renters. New data from real estate research firm Trulia says buying rather than renting, is now a far better financial deal in about 80 percent of the largest cities.
There's no guarantee when housing will finally bottom, but four plus years into the reset, we're much closer to the end than the beginning. If you've got your eye on ownership and live in an area where renting isn't a roaring deal, maybe it's time to start sniffing around the open houses. That is, if you think you'll be able to scale today's tougher mortgage lending standards.
Where Buying is the Best Deal
Trulia calculates a rent-vs.-buy ratio by comparing the median list price of homes in the 50 largest cities with the median rent for two-bedroom apartments, condos, and town homes. A ratio below 15 means buying is much less expensive than renting, after accounting for the total costs of home ownership. According to Trulia's second-quarter data run, buying is the better financial deal than renting in 39 of the 50 cities. No surprise, markets with a large foreclosure inventory (and thus soft prices) such as Las Vegas, Phoenix, and Miami top the list of cities where buying beats renting by the widest margin.
Read more...Survey: Buying a Home Beats Renting in Most Markets - CBS News
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