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10 Real Estate Stats from Last Week

Douglas Lazovick
1 min read

The first week of the new year/quarter/month often sees the release of a lot of statistical data from the the previous period. So, it’s not surprising that a lot of real estate related stats caught my attention last week. Lets take a look:

  1. 9.4% – The U.S. unemployment rate fell from 9.8% to 9.4% in December. Obviously great news. However, it is worth noting that it’s still possible for unemployment to tick up in the coming months as those who had given up looking for work, resume their job search and thus get added back into the unemployment figures.
  2. 103,000 – Number of jobs added in December. Many were projecting 175,000, so somewhat disappointing, but still heading in the right direction.
  3. 4.77% – Average rate for a 30 year fixed mortgage dropped to 4.77% from 4.86% the previous week. Mortgage rates had been ticking upward ever since November when rates hit 4.17%, the lowest on record.
  4. $967 Billion – The amount in mortgage originations the MBA expects in 2011, a 36% drop from 2010 and less than half the originations volume from 2009.
  5. 6.6% – The national vacancy rate for apartments in the fourth quarter of 2010. That’s down 0.5% from the third quarter and the lowest number since 2010. Furthermore, rents rose 0.5%.
  6. $60.1 Billion – The total amount of worldwide commercial real estate acquisitions in 2010 – a 23.8% increase from the $48.6 billion in acquisitions in 2009.
  7. $840,000 – The median price for a home in Manhattan in the forth quarter of 2010. And you thought housing prices are down…actually, they are – at least in Manhattan. $840,000 represents a 5.6% drop from the third quarter of 2010, when the median price was $890,000
  8. 35.06 – The Price-Rent ratio (price of an average home divided by the annual cost of renting that home) for East Bay, CA, the highest Price-Rent ratio for a major city/metropolitan area in the U.S.
  9. 11.71 – The Price-Rent ratio for Pittsburgh, PA, the lowest ratio in the U.S.
  10. 504,648 – The number of permanent loan modifications achieved between March 2009 and November 2010 under the Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP). A large number, for certain, but far short of the 3 to 4 million goal.

Note By BiggerPockets: These are opinions written by the author and do not necessarily represent the opinions of BiggerPockets.