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  Slump Busters! 

The Corelogic risk index has continually increased for the last seven quarters  CoreLogic®, a global property information, analytics and data-enabled solutions provider, today released its latest Mortgage Fraud Report. The report shows a 12.4 percent year-over-year increase in fraud risk at the end of the second quarter, as measured by the CoreLogic Mortgage Application Fraud Risk Index. 

A few observations on new competition, cost of agent retention and more  The gross margin for the average brokerage firm in the United States, as of June 30, 2018, has declined to 15 percent—down from 22 percent five years ago. While traditional brokerage firm gross commission, whether independent or franchised, is still nearly 21 percent, those firms have also declined proportionately over that period. It appears […]

A recent study sheds light on gross commission income The California Association of Realtors® and REAL Trends recently studied the financial metrics of teams. While full results are not available, there is one piece of data that demonstrates where a great deal of value resides in the residential brokerage industry. 

 South Region sees increased activity for 11th straight month; rest of country experiences year-over-year declines   

 A mandatory review of the Qualified Mortgage Rule is coming Will the overly restrictive rule get an update? Ever since the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) publish the Qualified Mortgage Rule (QM Rule) in 2014, mortgage lenders have complained that it is overly-restrictive and unnecessarily suppresses lending to creditworthy borrowers.  This may change in 2019, […]

Engel & Völkers Insight Report identifies key drivers that motivate an agent to make a brokerage change as well as what brokers can do to make sure they’re attracting and retaining the right talent Engel & Völkers recently released the results of its study, “Insight Report: The State of Real Estate Recruiting.” As recruiting remains a top challenge across the real estate industry, Engel […]

It’s not all doom and gloom. There are opportunities, and it’s not too late to execute a plan  In the book, Moneyball by Michael Lewis, the complete reinvention of a baseball team was chronicled. In the 16 years since the Oakland A’s leadership team looked to data to help make talent selection a science, virtually every sport at every […]

New Homeowners Pay $40,000 on Average to Buy and Move into a New Home The one-time costs of moving into a new home add up quickly and can come as a surprise to first-time buyers.

Community associations, commonly referred to as homeowners associations (HOAs), condominiums, housing cooperatives, and mixed-use communities, remain preferred places to call home for nearly 10 million Floridians, according to the 2018 Homeowner Satisfaction Survey, conducted recently by Zogby Analytics for the Foundation for Community Association Research (FCAR). The nationwide survey also closely examines the community association […]