Typically over Easter, Americans consume more than 16 million jelly beans. That's enough jelly beans to circle the globe not once, not twice, but three times — or to fill a plastic egg the size of a nine-story building.
Second-home sales at the start of 2021 were 90% higher than they were in mid-2020, and 77% higher in December despite a typical holiday slowdown. Also:
- In 2021, the average price of the top 10% of single-family homes in North America was $1.7 million, up 25% over 2020.
- The highest 2nd-home sales volume is in Franklin County, Florida, called the state’s forgotten coast due to its quieter towns and minimal development.
- Second is Sevier County, Tennessee, home of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, and Trigg County, Kentucky, known as Lake Country.
- Second homes are no longer the exclusive domain of billionaires!
National Association of Realtors (NAR) found that 35% of people aged 65 or above bought homes of at least 3,000-square-feet in 2020, compared with only 23% in 2017. Some retirees and older generations are UP-sizing their homes.
More than 8.5 million borrowers entered into mortgage forbearance at some point during the pandemic, representing over 15% of the US’s mortgage market. Today, that figure has shrunk to only 680,000 mortgages, a roughly 90% decline. Now there is chatter about a Government backed 40-year mortgage, per Marketwatch.
Per CNBC, lumber prices dipped below $900 after a recent high of over $1,300. Lumber accounts for 14-18% of a home's construction price.
One important aspect driving the under-building of new homes (a primary cause of rising prices and inflation) is that for a typical single-family home, about 25% of the price is made up of various kinds of burdens that come about from government policy. This includes the following, which makes things more difficult:
- Delays getting permits approved and developing land;
- Zoning laws requiring a certain amount of land to be unbuilt on, which then increases the cost of all the homes that you actually can build;
- Building code requirements that go beyond what the market requires;
- Inefficient zoning laws like minimum lot sizes and fees and taxes associated with home construction.
Per the NY Times, 35% of the cities in the US where homeowners stay longest are located in California. Los Angeles and Honolulu homeowners stay put longest at 18 years and 17 years respectively. The median years people stay in their homes in the TOP 20 is 5 years plus.
Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash
