Talking Points …
- An affordability index published by the CALIFORNIA ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS® reveals that just 44 percent of California residents were able to afford the median-priced home at the end of the first quarter. In comparison, during the same period last year, the rate was 56 percent, when affordability hit its highest level since the trade group began publishing its affordability statistics in 1988.
- A sharp decline in household formation has been exacerbated by the share of 18-to-34-year-olds living with their parents, which rose from about 27.6 percent before the Great Recession in 2007 to above 31 percent, according to Trulia. Furthermore, stagnant wages and college debt may explain why the share of millennials with jobs living with their parents is higher in 2013 at 24.6 percent than before the recession at 22.8 percent.
- The S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price index reported this week that home prices across America’s 20 major cities in May climbed 12.2 percent higher from a year earlier, which was higher than most expected and the biggest annual gain since March 2006.