First Time Homebuyers

Hidden Costs of Homeownership Can Add Up to Almost $10,000 Per Year

By Leah Shafer / August 18, 2015 /

At CandysDirt, we love real estate and we love homeownership! But with a house comes expenses beyond the mortgage and insurance. For the unprepared buyer, these can be a rude surprise. And nobody likes those. We’ve seen it before: First-time homebuyers focusing solely on the list price of a house when deciding how much they can…

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Airbnb, Realtor.com Partnership Targets Millennials Looking to ‘Try Before Buying’

By Leah Shafer / July 31, 2015 /

“Try before you buy” is a hard concept to implement in the world of real estate. But a new partnership between Airbnb and realtor.com aims to do just that for potential homebuyers, letting them experience a specific neighborhood before purchasing there. The partnership is particularly focused on millennials, who now represent the largest group of homebuyers in…

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Low Inventory is Keeping Home Prices High in Dallas, But is it Sustainable?

By Joanna England / February 26, 2015 /

  Case-Shiller’s recent Dec.2014 report shows home prices inching even further skyward, with an increase of 7.5 percent year-over-year, topping the national average of 4.5 percent by a healthy margin. Shrinking inventory is to blame, but one must wonder if supply will ever catch up at this rate. “As long as we have a tight…

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Tight Housing Market, Shifting Demographics Make for Big Changes in Homebuyer Profiles

By Leah Shafer / November 21, 2014 /

First-time homebuyers are being squeezed out, and you gotta move fast to buy! And people are hanging on to their houses for the longest time on record, according to a new study by the National Association of Realtors. Buyers are living in their homes for ten years, up from six years in 2008, and actually…

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San Antonio and Houston May be Popular With Millennials, but NAR Says Austin and Dallas are Better Values

By Joanna England / July 25, 2014 /

Where are all the first-time homebuyers? In their cozy rentals, that’s where! With a market almost completely devoid of newby buyers, and the rental market being as competitive as it is (just ask my friend looking for a single-family home in East Dallas!), and prices going up across all segments, it’s just hard to find…

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