CalHFA has announced it will end its School Facility Fee Down Payment Assistance Program, which has been responsible for providing more than 14,000 grants totaling more than $61 million. Associated with this down payment assistance was more than $3.3 billion in first mortgage loans for people purchasing newly constructed homes throughout California. The program currently has approximately $700,000 left in funds, and CalHFA anticipates the final funds being expended by the end of April.
CalHFA will continue to accept applications for SFF until funds are exhausted. Applications will be accepted on a first come, first served basis.
The Los Angeles Times
Among new Internet-based real estate ventures to pop up in recent months is one that enables house hunters to simultaneously search for just about every lifestyle criteria imaginable. Another protects would-be tenants from unwittingly renting from a struggling owner in the midst of a foreclosure.
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http://www.latimes.com/business/realestate/la-fi-lew-20120226,0,7465346.story
U.S. homes are expected to lose more than $681 billion in value during 2011 – 35 percent less than the $1.1 trillion lost in 2010 – according to analysis of a recent Zillow Real Estate Market Reports.
The bulk of the total value lost during 2011 was in the first half of the year. From January to June, the U.S. housing market lost $454 billion. From July to December, Zillow projects residential home value losses will total a significantly lower $227 billion.
Regionally, only nine out of 128 markets showed gains in home values during 2011.
The majority (92 percent) of markets analyzed for the report showed home value losses for 2011. The biggest home value losses, in terms of total dollars lost in 2011, were in the large MSAs of Los Angeles (down $75.5 billion), New York (down $44.8 billion), and Chicago (down $41.7 billion). The large overall losses were due to the high number of homes in these metro areas, along with decreases in median home values.
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Housingwire
Pending home sales in California declined from October to November, but grew over last year, the CALIFORNIA ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS® reported last week.
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http://www.housingwire.com/2011/12/21/california-pending-home-sales-drop-in-november-2
CNNMoney
Housing starts shot up to an annual rate of 685,000 in November, up 9.3 percent from October and 24.3 percent higher than a year earlier.
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http://money.cnn.com/2011/12/20/real_estate/construction_building_permits/index.htm?hpt=hp_t3
