The Unassuming Economist

On prices, rent, and mortgage:    

• Mortgage Refinancing Starts to Thaw as Rates Trend Down. It has been a frustrating wait for people who bought homes in the past few years, when mortgage rates have been high – Wall Street Journal
• Mortgages Could Shrug Off a Fed Cut—but Not This One – Barron’s
• House Price Appreciation by State and Metro Area: Second Quarter 2025 – NAHB
• US Housing Outlook – Apollo
• The U.S. housing market is ‘finally starting to listen’ to homebuyers plagued by high mortgage rates and home prices, economist says – Fortune

On sales, permits, starts, and supply:    

• Homebuilder inventory hits 2009 levels—creating deals in these housing markets. A record 121,000 completed single-family homes sat unsold in July, as affordability challenges weigh on buyers in key Sun Belt markets. – Fast Company
• Forget YIMBY. The housing shortage could disappear on its own. Demographic shifts and construction surges are likely to resolve the housing crisis without federal intervention. – Washington Post
• The 5 most competitive housing markets in America right now — and the 5 least. Some cities are still seeing bidding wars — but others are flooded with inventory – Quartz
• June Private Residential Construction Spending Edges Higher – NAHB
• U.S. construction spending fell in July amid a slow housing market. Construction spending was down 2.8% year-over-year in July, according to data from the U.S. Census Bureau – Quartz
• The Mobile Home Comeback: New California Program Offers Cash To Repair or Replace Aging Homes – Realtor.com
• Open Construction Jobs Rise in July – NAHB
• How We Are Working to Increase the Multifamily Housing Supply – Freddie Mac
• Congress continues to advance significant housing supply incentives – JP Morgan Chase

On other developments:    

• Bubble thought: What beliefs can reveal about housing market risks – Dallas Fed
• Dynamic Tables: Comparing Cities – Home Economics
• Trump May Declare a National Housing Emergency: What to Know – Time
• Bessent: Everything on table for housing affordability fixes – Axios
• Bessent says Trump administration will tackle high housing costs with new measures – Reuters
• Trump wants to ax an affordable housing grant, a lifeline for many rural communities – Los Angeles Times   
• Trump Considers Declaring National Housing Emergency This Fall – Realtor.com
• Yes, America Has a Housing Emergency. But Trump will make it worse – Paul Krugman
• The Trump Administration’s Fake Housing Emergency. The results of America’s overly burdensome housing regulations aren’t great. But they’re not an “emergency.” – Reason
• The Face of Homeownership in the U.S. is Getting Older—What You Need to Know – Realtor.com
• There’s a housing market shift afoot—just ask Realtors. Among real estate agents that Zoodealio and ResiClub surveyed, 81% say buyers are gaining leverage in their local housing market—that share is even higher among agents based in the Southwest (96%). – Fast Company
• NAHB HBGI:  Relative Gains for Smaller Markets, Particularly for Multifamily – NAHB
• America is escaping its office crisis. The torment caused by covid-19 and high interest rates appears to be over – The Economist
• Cruel Summer: Why the U.S. Housing Market Is Stuck – Realtor.com
• Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” and the Affordable Housing Crisis: A Closer Look –CEPR
• U.S. Housing Costs to Return to ‘Normal’ by 2030 With Stable Price Growth and Moderately Lower Rates – Realtor.com
• The ‘abundance movement’ needs to help distressed places, not just booming ones – Brookings 
• Strong Foundations: A Playbook for Housing and Economic Growth – AEI
• Wall Street Is Killing the Housing Market. Investment giants are buying up homes and pricing real people out of the market. But it doesn’t have to be this way. – Inequality.org
• I Did My Dissertation on Housing Displacement. Then I Experienced It Myself. If someone like me can get trapped in the cycle of housing instability, anyone can. But the solutions are out there. – Inequality.org
• Metro Area Growth at Risk from Recent Drop in Immigration – Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies
• California and Florida Top New List of the Riskiest Housing Markets in the Nation – Realtor.com

From a paper by Ali Soltani, Alireza Dehghani, and Parviz Azizi:

“Urban expansion has traditionally been studied in terms of horizontal sprawl, overlooking the role of vertical densification. This paper adopts a volumetric approach to analyze the spatiotemporal dynamics of urban growth in the Tehran Metropolitan Region (TMR) from 1985 to 2024, addressing two key objectives: (a) to examine border patterns of volumetric growth, demographic shifts, and intra-urban variations, and (b) to identify the underlying drivers of volumetric expansion. Using Landsat imagery, Global Human Settlement Layer (GHSL) data, and population statistics from the Statistical Center of Iran, we apply spatial-statistical methods and the XGBoost-SHAP machine learning framework to assess urban expansion patterns and their driving forces. Our findings reveal a transition from vertical densification to horizontal sprawl, with urban expansion increasingly adopting an outward trajectory. Intra-urban analysis uncovers a diffusion-coalescence pattern, where vertical densification often follows horizontal expansion but can also occur concurrently. While older urban segments continue to densify vertically due to land scarcity, newly developed areas exhibit distinct volumetric characteristics, reflecting a cyclical interplay between centralization and decentralization. The XGBoost-SHAP analysis highlights a shift in driving forces from spatial inertia to population-driven growth and, more recently, to economic and geographic constraints. By integrating remote sensing, spatial analysis, and machine learning, this study provides a systematic and data-driven framework for understanding the spatiotemporal dynamics of urban expansion and its underlying drivers. The findings underscore the importance of integrated urban planning strategies that balance vertical and horizontal growth, optimize land use, and enhance sustainability. Incorporating volumetric analysis into planning frameworks can foster more adaptive, resource-efficient, and resilient urban development.”

From a paper by José Alberto Fuinhas, Daniela Castilho, Volkan Kaymaz, and Matheus Koengkan:

“In this empirical investigation, the influence of tourism on housing prices was studied for 13 European Union countries from 2005 to 2019 using cs-ARDL and Quantile cs-ARDL econometric approaches. The findings reveal a positive effect running from the tourism sector (represented by tourism revenues and the number of arrivals) to housing price indices, indicating that this industry significantly impacts real estate markets. Moreover, the results show that economic growth, bank credit, and population growth drive house prices. These outcomes have significant implications for policymakers, highlighting the dual nature of tourism’s impact and the need for a careful balance between promoting tourism as an economic strategy and ensuring housing affordability for residents.”

On cross-country:

• 2025 Global Housing and Mortgage Outlook Mid-Year Update – Fitch
• A broken housing market is driving inequality right across Europe – and fuelling the far right. From Lisbon to Amsterdam, housing policy has led to haves and have-nots. But, as our new series uncovers, it doesn’t have to be this way – The Guardian

Working papers and conferences:

• Mortgage Market Structure and the Transmission of Monetary Policy During the Great Inflation – VoxEU
• Central Bank Communication and House Price Expectations – SSRN
• Housing Market Spillovers in China via Trading Volume: A Comparison of Two Spillover Indexes – SSRN
• Chinese Housing Market Sentiment Index: A Generative Ai Approach – SSRN 
• Residential real estate (RRE) lending standards: determinants and financial stability implications – ECB

On China:

• China rolls out official ‘property supermarkets’ to prop up creaking housing market. Proponents say these property hubs make transactions more centralised and trustworthy as they are vetted by local governments – South China Morning Post

On other countries:  

• [Canada] Home construction must double over next decade to restore 2019 affordability: CMHC – Bloomberg
• [Canada] Housing shortages in Canada – CMHC
• [Canada] Updating Canada’s housing supply shortages: new housing supply gap estimates – CMHC
• [Canada] CMHC gives up on comparing housing affordability to 2004 levels – Globe and Mail  
• [Canada] Doubling Home Construction Will Barely Improve Affordability in Canada: CMHC – Bloomberg
• [Canada] Canada home prices to decline 2% as trade war hits homebuyer confidence – Reuters
• [France] French Housing Loans Recovery Underway but Remains Fragile – Fitch Ratings
• [Hong Kong] Despite property market slump, Hong Kong must increase housing supply. Government should not repeat post-1997 mistake of shelving plans to increase long-term housing supply because of a temporary market dip – South China Morning Post
• [Hong Kong] The Hong Kong property developer rushing to refinance billions of dollars in loans. New World’s negotiations with banks come after years of ambitious debt-fuelled expansion – FT
• [Portugal] Foreigners pay twice as much as locals to buy Portugal homes – Bloomberg
• [South Korea] South Korea to Announce Measures to Cool House Prices, Yonhap – Bloomberg
• [Spain] La crisis de la vivienda también impacta en el empleo: reducir un 30% el precio crearía 410.000 trabajos. La rebaja inyectaría en la economía 25.000 millones de euros en cinco años, ya que las familias podrían consumir más, según un informe de CC OO – El Pais
• [United Kingdom] UK ministers urged to ‘get on’ with stronger homebuyer protections. Consumer group warns people have more rights buying a toaster than a new house – FT
• [United Kingdom] Interest-only mortgage could make comeback as regulator revisits rules. Financial Conduct Authority looks at whether the product it once called a ‘ticking timebomb’ can support home ownership – The Guardian

On prices, rent, and mortgage:    

• U.S. Home Price Growth Cools to Near-Two-Year Low. The S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller National Home Price Index rose 2.7% in the 12 months to April – Wall Street Journal
• Case-Shiller: National House Price Index Up 2.7% year-over-year in April –Calculated Risk
• Housing market at risk of “sustained downturn” as price growth cools – Axios
• Mapping Home Price Changes – New York Fed
• Housing market map: Zillow just released its updated home price forecast for 400-plus housing markets. Zillow projects that U.S. home prices will fall 0.7% from May 2025 to May 2026. – Fast Company
• These 96 housing markets are seeing falling home prices. Among the 300 largest metro-area housing markets, these 96 markets are seeing falling home prices on a year-over-year basis. – Fast Company
• What Trump’s Bomb Strike on Iran Means for Mortgage Rates in the US – Realtor.com

On sales, permits, starts, and supply:    

• Housing market weakness triggers Lennar to offer biggest incentives since 2009. There is a consensus among major publicly traded homebuilders that the spring 2025 housing market was softer than expected. – Fast Company
• Single-family Construction Loan Volume Grows – NAHB
• Home Prices Stay Steady as Buyers Take Their Time – Realtor.com
• Buyer’s or seller’s housing market? Zillow’s new rating for 250 major markets. Where home sellers—and home buyers—have the most power right now, according to Zillow’s updated analysis released in June. – Fast Company
• Real USA Home Prices Flat for 1 Year & 19% Above 2006 Peak – Real Estate Decoded
• NAR: Existing-Home Sales Increased to 4.03 million SAAR in May; Down 0.7% YoY. Median House Prices Increased 1.3% Year-over-Year – Calculated Risk
• Existing Home Sales Edge Higher in May – NAHB
• New Home Sales Decrease to 623,000 Annual Rate in May. Median New Home Price is Down 7% from the Peak due to Change in Mix – Calculated Risk
• California Home Sales “Sputter” in May; 4th Look at Local Markets. California Active Inventory Highest Reached 67-Month High – Calculated Risk
• Home Sales Stay Sluggish in May as Mortgage Rates and Uncertainty Weigh on Market – Realtor.com
• Home Sales Rose in May, but Housing Market Is Still Sluggish. Existing-home sales edge up 0.8%, ending two-month streak of declines – Wall Street Journal
• U.S. New Home Sales Slump as High Mortgage Rates Persist. Sales of new single-family homes fell 13.7% to 623,000 in May – Wall Street Journal
• How Small Apartments in Big Buildings Became the US Norm. To what extent was the construction boom a product of the sometimes-perverse incentives and disincentives facing developers? – Bloomberg
• Homeownership: Not Enough Supply for Middle-Income Buyers. For teachers, nurses and other skilled workers, few options. – New York Times
• California Democrats wage internal war over Gavin Newsom’s late push to build more housing. Governor is drawing heavy resistance to his housing development proposal. – Politico

On other developments:    

• Interactive Tool Charts Pandemic Homebuying Trends – San Francisco Fed
• The State of the Nation’s Housing 2025 – Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies
• Unease in the Housing Market Amid a Worsening Affordability Crisis – Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies
• Zohran Mamdani’s policies will (mostly) not bring abundance to NYC. Progressive ideas still try to defy economic realities. – Noahpinion
• Is U.S. Lumber Self-Reliance Possible? – NAHB
• Institutional Investors Aren’t the Villains of America’s Housing Market – National Review
• More Homeowners Find Themselves Underwater. Some who bought around the market peak in pandemic boomtowns owe more on their mortgages than their homes are worth – Wall Street Journal
• Buyers in the Priciest Housing Markets Need 80% Down To Afford Monthly Costs – Realtor.com
• Thoughts on the Big, Fascinating, Exciting Mamdani Upset! The affordability crisis is real. Mamdani’s offering solutions where others, including the president, not only have nothing, but are making it worse. – Jared Bernstein 
• New York’s Housing Crisis Is So Bad That a Socialist Is Poised to Become Mayor. Zohran Mamdani, a 33-year-old who campaigned on rent freezes, emerged victorious in the city’s Democratic primary – Wall Street Journal
• Will Zohran Mamdani’s Housing Plan Actually Work in New York City? – Realtor.com
• On Housing, All New York Politicians Are Socialists. Allegedly sane, centrist opponents of New York City’s socialist mayoral candidate are all too happy to regulate rental housing into the ground. – Reason
• New Yorkers Vote to Make Their Housing Shortage Worse. Austin, Texas, and other red-state cities have set an example for how to make housing markets work – New York Times
• A New Rail Line May Come to New York. Will a Housing Boom Follow? The Interborough Express, a rail line connecting Brooklyn and Queens, could spur the building of tens of thousands of homes. Obstacles await. – New York Times
• Elevated Rates, Challenging Affordability Conditions Put a Damper on New Home Sales – NAHB
• Housing market at risk of “sustained downturn” as price growth cools – Axios
• Confronting the affordable-housing crisis – McKinsey
• Why Do Republicans Support the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit? Publicly funded homes in some cities are costing taxpayers more than $1 million per unit, but Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” would increase funding for these inefficient projects. – Reason
• San Francisco’s Luxury Housing Market Is Booming Again Thanks to AI Wealth. A new report from Sotheby’s International Realty says the top end of the market has undergone a renaissance. – Bloomberg
• Affordability Crisis Worsens as Home Prices Hit ‘Shocking’ New High—5 Times What the Typical Household Earns – Realtor.com
• Where Are the Least Competitive Housing Markets? – Zillow
• Housing Department to Move Headquarters, Booting National Science Foundation. The plan to depart Washington and take over the science agency building in Virginia raised questions about where N.S.F. employees would go. – New York Times