Move.com launches today

Move Inc., formerly Homestore, today officially launched Move.com, giving home buyers and renters access to homes for sale and houses and apartments for rent, as well as home-buying and moving resources.

Move.com is billing itself as a real estate search engine and has more than 3 million existing homes for sale from Realtor.com and millions more newly built homes and rentals from hundreds of sites all over the Web.

In addition to property listings, Move.com features tutorials on home buying and selling, home value reports, an  more...

MLS-related real estate site announces expansion plans

CleanOffer.com, a Web-based tool that provides consumers with access to multiple listing service property information, has added Google Maps-based property searches, open-house searches and open-house reports, the company announced.

The company also announced expansion plans beyond its base in the San Francisco Bay Area.

"We are continuing to make improvements to CleanOffer as we expand into the Peninsula and the East Coast and are very excited to share our new features w  more...

Iowa real estate sales jump 20%

Iowa home sales rose significantly in March compared to one year earlier, while the statewide median home price was mostly unchanged, according to the Iowa Association of Realtors.

Realtors reported 3,225 single-family home sales in March, up 20 percent from 2,671 in March 2005.

The median price of an Iowa home in March was $109,750, up just 0.4 percent from a year earlier when the price was $109,400.  more...

Fannie Mae's 'best-in-class' image a 'façade'

The long-held image of mortgage finance giant Fannie Mae as a low-risk, best-in-class institution was a "façade," the government sponsored corporation's regulator said today in a report summing up findings of a 27-month-long investigation into Fannie's accounting practices.

The report from the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight details an unethical corporate culture where Fannie Mae employees manipulated accounting and earnings to trigger bonuses  more...

Highest real estate foreclosure rates found in Sun, Rust belts

Indianapolis, Atlanta and Dallas have the highest foreclosure rates among the nation's 100 largest metropolitan areas, according to an industry report released today.

RealtyTrac's 2006 U.S.  more...

New tech standard offers broader access to MLS

A new real estate information technology standard that enables brokers and vendors to use one program instead of many different ones to access multiple MLSs was unveiled last week at the National Association of Realtors' Midyear Legislative Meetings & Trade Expo in Washington, D.C.

The Real Estate Transaction Standard, or RETS, Version 2 Web Service addresses a need in the industry to use open standards to exchange information, improve tool support, lower development costs and improve security, while accommodating new technologica  more...

High real estate prices can lead to job loss

Rising home prices and rents in Massachusetts could continue a trend in job losses and out-migration unless more housing and particularly more affordable housing is made available, according to a reported prepared by Barry Bluestone, director at the Center for Urban and Regional Policy at Northeastern University.

The report, commissioned by the Massachusetts Association of Realtors trade group, notes that the total population in Massachusetts shrunk by about 19,000 from July 1, 2003, to July 1  more...

HUD approves $74.5 million to rebuild Texas

Housing and Urban Development Secretary Alphonso Jackson on Monday announced he is approving a $74.5 million plan to help 29 East Texas counties to recover from the devastation left in the wake of Hurricane Rita.

The disaster recovery funding, provided through HUD's Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) Program, will be distributed among four regional planning agencies to target unmet housing and infrastructure needs along the Texas Gulf Coast.

"Texas will put this funding to work where the needs are greatest," Jackson said.  more...

Overnight real estate rates decline

Long-term mortgage interest rates were lower Monday, and the benchmark 10-year Treasury bond yield fell to 5.04 percent.

The 30-year fixed-rate average slipped to 6.18 percent, and the 15-year fixed-rate dropped to 5.85 percent. The 1-year adjustable dipped to 5.28 percent.

The 30-year Treasury bond yield slid to 5.13 percent.

Rates are current as of 7:15 p.m. Eastern Standard Time.

Mortgage rate figures are according to Bankrate.com, which publishes nightly averages based on its survey of 4,000 banks in 50 states.  more...