Housing Price Support

Here is a Bloomberg article on institutional investors buying single family homes.  I believe this is providing support for the housing market and is a mitigating factor to concerns that waves of foreclosures will bring the whole housing market down.   One interesting point is that investors have expanded their geographic net and are now buying homes in cities like Houston, TX, rather than just Phoenix and Las Vegas.

Update:  I just saw this post on Calculated Risk.   This passage is amazing and explains why the institutional investors are moving to Texas:

Tom Lawler sent me an update on Phoenix today:

The Arizona MLS reported that residential home sales by realtors in the Greater Phoenix, Arizona area totaled 9,129 in June, down 17.9% from last June’s pace. Bank-owned properties were 14.1% of last month’s sales, down from 40.8% last June, while last month’s short-sales share was 32.8%, up from 27.0% last June. Active listings in June totaled 19,857, down 1.5% from May and down 32.0% from a year ago. The median sales price last month was $141,000, up 27.6% from last June. Citing data from the Cromford Report, ARMLS said that foreclosures pending in Maricopa County in June totaled 17,910, down 35.1% from a year ago.

Look at the sharp decline in bank owned properties sold - this was down to 14.1% of all sales, down from 40.8% last June.

There are not enough properties in Phoenix to support all the money institutional investors are raising.

Updated Update:  Here is another post from Calculated Risk, this one on declining inventory in Las Vegas, the city hit hardest by the housing crash.   Read the whole, short post, because there is too much information for me to extract a few data points without confusing the context.  The bottom line is that inventory is dropping, distressed sales are dropping and Vegas is on track for a record year.