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Category: Industry News
Industry News
Sales of newly-built homes shrink, prices still climb due to market disruptions
Sales of newly-constructed single family homes declined 5.9% during May to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 769,000 – the lowest in a year, according to estimates from the Census Bureau. Analysts say builders slowed sales due to higher material costs and declining availability of labor, material and lots. Despite [..]
Industry News
Pandemic prompted remote workers to snatch up vacation homes
Vacation home purchases skyrocketed during 2020, with the trend continuing this year, according to a report from the National Association Realtors®. Workers with the ability to log on from anywhere are credited with spurring the surge. “Vacation homes are a hot commodity at the moment,” said Lawrence Yun, NAR’s chief [..]
Industry News
Amazon to invest $300 million from its Housing Equity Fund for 3,000 new affordable housing units in three metro areas
Amazon will invest $300 million to build 3,000 new affordable housing units in the Puget Sound, Arlington/Metro D.C., and Nashville regions. The ecommerce giant will work with “traditional and non-traditional partners,” to acquire land near public transit in hopes of creating move-in ready homes by as early as 2025. The [..]
Industry News
Banking Inclusion Initiative launched to help unbanked individuals and communities
Pledging to accelerate unbanked individuals’ access to affordable mainstream accounts and to address long-standing inequities, Wells Fargo & Company last month launched a 10-year commitment dubbed the Banking Inclusion Initiative. The financial services company will focus on Black and African Americans, Hispanics, and Native American/Alaska Native families. Together, the target [..]
Industry News
Condo comeback fueling FOMO
Condos are making a comeback, declared Dean Jones, head of a Seattle-based real estate consultancy and brokerage that specializes in market research, product development, marketing and sales. In a recent blog for Realogics Sotheby’s International Realty (RSIR) where he is CEO and owner, Jones described the current market in the [..]
Industry News
Seattle claims fastest growing city title for 2020
Seattle added 16,400 more residents between July 1, 2019 and July 1, 2020, bumping up its population by 2.2%. That growth rate in the midst of the global pandemic and widespread civil unrest – made it the nation’s fastest-growing big city in 2020. Only one other city in Washington with [..]
Industry News
New appliance converts food scraps, other waste into compost
Within days of its rollout, a Canadian company trashed its modest funding goal for a revolutionary kitchen device that converts waste into compost – but it wasn’t because of skeptics. Apparently, 8,100 backers agreed “food waste is gross. It’s time for a change.” They gave Lomi (the name of the [..]
Industry News
News In Brief: June 2021
When you go through the security line at the airport, unless you’re in pre-check, you know the drill. Take off your shoes and put them back on. But that could be a thing of the past soon, thanks to new shoe scanning technology developed by researchers at a Washington state-based [..]
Industry News
Study shows how overregulation worsens housing affordability crisis
Regulatory costs account for $93,870, or 23.8% of the current average sales price of a new home ($394,300), according to a recent study by the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB). The group said rising regulatory costs are a limiting factor on housing supply, “particularly for the entry-level market in [..]