“What’s The GOOD News?” July 2019

1.* Investors purchased a record share of Dallas-area homes last year. And these for-profit homebuyers are expected to continue to gobble up thousands of houses in North Texas and nationwide. Home investors are having the biggest impact on the lower price ranges of the Dallas home market — the same sector first-time buyers are shopping. More than 14% of low-priced houses in the Dallas area sold to investors in 2018, according to new data by CoreLogic. Overall, more than 8% of Dallas homes of all prices were snapped up by investors. "Investor buying activity in the U.S. is at record highs," CoreLogic's Ralph McLaughlin said. "It's not the big institutional guys that are leading the increase in home buying — it's the smaller guys. "They are buying homes that are in the lower third of prices — they are essentially buying starter homes," McLaughin said.

2.* DFW reaches 7.5M population in 2018. Aided in part by adding more than a million residents from 2010 to 2018, Dallas-Fort Worth was the fourth most populated metro region last year. Population estimates released last week show that Dallas-Fort Worth was home to more than 7.5 million as of July 1, 2018. Only New York City, Los Angeles, and Chicago metropolitan areas had a larger population. DFW accounted for 2.3 percent of the entire nation’s population last year. On the whole, the U.S. was home to 327 million last year with nearly 86 percent of the population residing in metro areas.

3.* Dallas is home to 11 of the 25 top Texas suburbs in which to buy a house — but only one cracks the top 10 in this new ranking from Niche. Cities were ranked on criteria including quality of public schools, crime and safety, housing, nightlife, how good the area is for families, and diversity. Niche gathered data from the U.S. Census Bureau, FBI and other sources to feed its ranking. Niche defined a suburb as a place located within a census-defined urbanized area, but outside the principal city, and with a population of at least 1,000. Leading the way among North Texas suburbs on Niche's 2019 Best Suburbs to Buy a House in Texas list is Frisco at No. 9. Setting Frisco at the front of the pack was its population of 155,363, the median home value of $335,900, and the reported statistic that three-fourths of residents own their homes. Coming in close behind are Fate 10, Highland Village 11, Flower Mound 13, Coppell 15, Allen 19, Southlake 21, Little Elm 22, Oak Leaf 23, Sunnyvale 24 & Lowry Crossing 25.

4.* For potential home buyers, is it time to make the leap in Dallas-Fort Worth? For the past several years, when it came to home sales in Dallas-Fort Worth, most of the bargaining power has been in the hands of the seller. A homeowner would put a house on the market, and within 24 hours receive multiple offers for thousands of dollars higher than the asking price. But the tide may be turning just a bit. Home sales fell in May, a sign that buyers may have a bit more bargaining power this summer in the Metroplex. The HomesUSA.com New Home Sales Index, which tracks a 12-month a rolling average of sales prices in Texas’ four largest metro areas, reports that there were 1,224 posted pending sales of North Texas homes in May, down 6% from 1,301 pending sales in April. “The purchasing power to buy a home has been bolstered by falling mortgage rates, and buyers are responding,” said Lawrence Yun, the association’s chief economist. That’s good news for Metroplex home buyers!

5.* Dallas rents aren’t going down any time soon! North Texas picked up more new apartment renters than any area in the United States during the second quarter of 2019, according to data released last week by RealPage. As of July 1, DFW has 10,446 more occupied apartments than it did three months ago, the biggest quarterly jump in more than two decades, according to the property management company. DFW's apartment occupancy rate is now 94.9%, a touch higher than it was at the same point in 2018 when it was 94.8%. “Apartment demand in Dallas-Fort Worth reached a high that hasn’t been seen since in more than 20 years. This really underscores North Texas’ strength at drawing new jobs and new residents,” said RealPage market analyst Adam Couch. “As important finance, business services and transportation hub, Dallas-Fort Worth has created more jobs and drawn in more residents than any other area of the country in recent years.”