By Kerry Smith NAR calls rent caps “putting a Band-Aid on a bleeding artery.” The increase cap could impact about 1 in 4 U.S. units that have Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac-backed mortgages. WASHINGTON – A coalition of 17 senators sent a letter to the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) on Monday requesting a way to limit rental increases in apartment units that have mortgages held by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac – roughly one out of every four U.S. units. According to the letter, the senators have held multiple hearings on the rent topic, and heard “repeated reports of investors using
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By Ron Hurtibise While Fla.-owned Citizens Property Ins. continues to grow, regulators this week approved moving 184K policies to private insurers, with Slide taking up to 100K. TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Recently created Slide Insurance and four other companies have been approved to take up to 184,000 policies out of Citizens Property Insurance Corp., Florida’s “insurer of last resort.” Slide’s CEO Bruce Lucas on Tuesday characterized his company’s approval to take over up to 100,000 Citizens policies as “one of the largest takeout approvals ever in Florida, if not the largest,” according to the insurance-news website Artemis.bm. The Florida Office of
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By Kerry Smith Contrary to national numbers in July, Fla. sentiment fell 2.1 points as residents worried about the U.S. economy and planned to cut back on spending. GAINESVILLE, Fla. – July consumer sentiment among Floridians dropped 2.1 points to 66.8, a drop from a revised figure of 68.9 in June, according to the University of Florida’s monthly survey. The decline moves in the opposite direction of July U.S. consumer sentiment, which surged over seven points higher. “Despite a resilient labor market in Florida with an unemployment rate holding steady at 2.6% since January and a labor force that surpassed
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By Kerry Smith The federal oversight group said Risk Rating 2.0 is an improvement, but it suggested a number of changes, including greater transparency on how rates are calculated. WASHINGTON – The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO), sometimes called the “congressional watchdog,” completed a study of the National Flood Insurance Program’s (NFIP) recent update, Risk Rating 2.0. In the report, the GAO said the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), which oversees NFIP, has two conflicting goals that are often at odds with each other – providing flood insurance to Americans at a reasonable cost while making sure owners’ premiums cover
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By Rebecca San Juan Census Bureau: Miami-Dade and Broward lost residents 2020-2022, even as the state grew 3%. Some residents moved to less populated Fla. metros; some left the country. MIAMI – Miriam Merino’s life might cause anyone to think she enjoyed the best of Miami-Dade County. On her $400,000 real estate salary, she said she could afford weekly dinners at The River Oyster Bar and the latest $6,500 Santa Cruz Tallboy Mountain bike to ride on her next adventure in Costa Rica’s Vuelta al Lago Arenal or Oleta River State Park in Miami. She traveled around the globe and
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By Michael Iakovou and Olivia Piluso Florida charges a transfer fee – a documentary stamp tax – on most real estate transactions, but there are exceptions. What is it, when is it applied and how much is charged? Read on. ORLANDO, Fla. – What is transfer tax? Transfer tax is a tax imposed on the seller during a conveyance of property. In Florida, transfer tax is referred to as a documentary stamp tax. So, what do you need to be aware of when it comes to Florida’s real estate transfer tax, primarily as it relates to transfers between private parties?
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By Vicki Munson An appeals court agreed with a lower court’s decision: Zillow’s use of VHT photos was copyright infringement. Agents often hire VHT to take property photos, but the allowable use of those photos is generally spelled out in a contract. SEATTLE – An appeals court upheld VHT’s rights to control use of its copyrighted photos and in a lawsuit – VHT Inc. V. Zillow Group Inc. – ordered Zillow to pay $2 million in damages. The owner of any photo that appears online enjoys copyright protection of that image. Anyone that copies a photo and uses it, even
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By Shannon Allen A Realtor completed a professional apartment-building property appraisal on behalf of the seller, and the valuation was used to negotiate a final price with the buyer. But the seller later filed an ethics complaint because the Realtor managed the buyer’s properties. Is it an ethics violation? ORLANDO, Fla. – Dear Shannon: I’m a long-time Realtor and property manager in a challenging situation – a complaint has been filed against me. I was hired by a seller to appraise an apartment building they wanted to sell. To determine a fair price, the buyer and seller agreed to get
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By Alex Veiga Some economists predict a slight drop in rents, but only in some metros – and even there it won’t have a big impact after years of rising rental costs. LOS ANGELES – When viewed through a wide lens, renters across the U.S. finally appear to be getting some relief, thanks in part to the biggest apartment construction boom in decades. Median rent rose just 0.5% in June, year over year, after falling in May for the first time since the pandemic hit the U.S. Some economists project U.S. rents will be down modestly this year after soaring
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By Flavia Furlan Nunes Regulators want to boost capital requirements, but, as proposed, they’re targeting banks that offer mortgages with higher loan-to-value ratios. That could raise rates. WASHINGTON – The Federal Reserve, Federal Depository Insurance Corporation (FDIC) and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) released on Thursday the proposed changes for the Basel III rule (called the Basel endgame), which significantly increases capital requirements for banks. If implemented, the changes will affect the mortgage industry, and trade groups are already coming out in opposition to the new regulation. As expected, the rules target financial institutions with $100
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