Daily Archives: April 10, 2018

Housing Sentiment Remains Volatile, Edges Back Up

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Washington, D.C. – April 9, 2018 (PRNewswire) The Fannie Mae Home Purchase Sentiment Index® (HPSI) rose 2.5 points in March to 88.3, reversing last month’s decrease. The increase can be attributed to increases in three of the six HPSI components. The net share of respondents who said now is a good time to buy a home increased 10 percentage points compared to February. Additionally, the net share who reported that now is a good time to sell a home increased 3 percentage points. The net share who said home prices will go up in the next 12 months decreased 3 percentage points in March, while the net share of consumers who said mortgage rates will go down over the next 12 months also increased 5 percentage points. Americans expressed no change in their sense of job security, with the net share who say they are not concerned about losing their job staying flat month over month. Finally, the net share reporting that their income is significantly higher than it was 12 months ago was also unchanged.

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“The HPSI’s recent run of volatility continued in March, as it recovered last month’s loss and remained within the five-point range of the past twelve months,” said Doug Duncan, senior vice president and chief economist at Fannie Mae. “The primary driver of this month’s increase was the sizable rise in the net share of consumers who think it’s a good time to buy a home, which returned the indicator to its year-ago level. On the whole, a slight majority of consumers continue to express optimism regarding the overall direction of the economy.”

HOME PURCHASE SENTIMENT INDEX – COMPONENT HIGHLIGHTS

Fannie Mae’s 2018 Home Purchase Sentiment Index (HPSI) increased in March by 2.5 points to 88.3. The HPSI is up 3.8 points compared with the same time last year.

  • The net share of Americans who say it is a good time to buy a home increased 10 percentage points to 32%.
  • The net share of those who say it is a good time to sell rose 3 percentage points to 39%, matching the survey high last seen in June 2017.
  • The net share of Americans who say home prices will go up fell 3 percentage points to 42% in March, continuing the decreasing trend from last month.
  • The net share of those who say mortgage rates will go down over the next 12 months rose 5 percentage points to -52%.
  • The net share of Americans who say they are not concerned about losing their job remained at 71% in March.
  • The net share of those who say their household income is significantly higher than it was 12 months ago remained at 17%.

ABOUT FANNIE MAE’S HOME PURCHASE SENTIMENT INDEX

The Home Purchase Sentiment Index (HPSI) distills information about consumers’ home purchase sentiment from Fannie Mae’s National Housing Survey® (NHS) into a single number. The HPSI reflects consumers’ current views and forward-looking expectations of housing market conditions and complements existing data sources to inform housing-related analysis and decision making. The HPSI is constructed from answers to six NHS questions that solicit consumers’ evaluations of housing market conditions and address topics that are related to their home purchase decisions. The questions ask consumers whether they think that it is a good or bad time to buy or to sell a house, what direction they expect home prices and mortgage interest rates to move, how concerned they are about losing their jobs, and whether their incomes are higher than they were a year earlier.

ABOUT FANNIE MAE’S NATIONAL HOUSING SURVEY

The most detailed consumer attitudinal survey of its kind, Fannie Mae’s National Housing Survey (NHS) polled approximately 1,000 Americans via live telephone interview to assess their attitudes toward owning and renting a home, home and rental price changes, homeownership distress, the economy, household finances, and overall consumer confidence. Homeowners and renters are asked more than 100 questions used to track attitudinal shifts, six of which are used to construct the HPSI (findings are compared with the same survey conducted monthly beginning June 2010). As cell phones have become common and many households no longer have landline phones, the NHS contacts 70 percent of respondents via their cell phones (as of January 2018). For more information, please see the Technical Notes. Fannie Mae conducts this survey and shares monthly and quarterly results so that we may help industry partners and market participants target our collective efforts to stabilize the housing market in the near-term, and provide support in the future. The March 2018 National Housing Survey was conducted between March 1, 2018 and March 25, 2018. Most of the data collection occurred during the first two weeks of this period. Interviews were conducted by PSB, in coordination with Fannie Mae.

DETAILED HPSI & NHS FINDINGS

For detailed findings from the March 2018 Home Purchase Sentiment Index and National Housing Survey, as well as a brief HPSI overview and detailed white paper, technical notes on the NHS methodology, and questions asked of respondents associated with each monthly indicator, please visit the Surveys page on fanniemae.com. Also available on the site are in-depth special topic studies, which provide a detailed assessment of combined data results from three monthly studies of NHS results.

Fannie Mae helps make the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage and affordable rental housing possible for millions of Americans. We partner with lenders to create housing opportunities for families across the country. We are driving positive changes in housing finance to make the home buying process easier, while reducing costs and risk. To learn more, visit fanniemae.com and follow us on twitter.com/fanniemae.

Redfin Releases New Data Showing No Major Gaps in Pay Between Women and Men

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New gender pay report published in conjunction with Equal Pay Day

Seattle, WA – April 10, 2018 (PRNewswire) (NASDAQ: RDFN) — Redfin (www.redfin.com), the next-generation real estate brokerage, today released new data on employee pay by gender. Gaps in salary between men and women employed at Redfin are mostly small, in large part because the company tries to be rigorous about paying employees based on objective guidelines.

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Redfin calculated a weighted average to determine pay equity across ten job categories where there are at least two men and two women in that category. Redfin does not currently have enough data across a number of departments to make the same comparisons based on race, ethnicity and non-binary gender.

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Although pay gaps between women and men were limited and in some cases favored women, Redfin examined the underlying reasons for a few outlier categories: agents, managers of agent teams and recruiters. Redfin found that gaps between male and female agents and agent managers are the result of men having higher tenure, as agents earn modest increases to their base salaries over time. For recruiters, Redfin found that the gap is in part due to the fact that some employees with the same title are more senior and closer to a promotion.

“We’re glad to see that many groups at Redfin have no major gap in average pay between men and women. But that doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be gaps in pay between individuals. We constantly ask ourselves how we can pay people fairly, but still reward top performers. It’s easy to do one or the other. It’s hard to do both,” said Redfin CEO Glenn Kelman.

Redfin increasingly relies on market data to determine when to implement pay increases for individuals as well as for all employees across a job category. Redfin has also taken steps to address the impact of pay history and competing job offers, which can impact gender pay parity. Last year, Redfin discontinued the practice of asking candidates about pay history, which can perpetuate biases in pay.

To read the full report, with additional data on how Redfin pays women and men and how these figures were calculated, visit: www.redfin.com.

About Redfin
Redfin (www.redfin.com) is the next-generation real estate brokerage, combining its own full-service agents with modern technology to redefine real estate in the consumer’s favor. Founded by software engineers, Redfin has the country’s #1 brokerage website and offers a host of online tools to consumers, including the Redfin Estimate, the automated home-value estimate with the industry’s lowest published error rate for listed homes. Homebuyers and sellers enjoy a full-service, technology-powered experience from Redfin real estate agents, while saving thousands in commissions. Redfin serves more than 80 major metro areas across the U.S. The company has closed more than $60 billion in home sales.