The financial news that actually matters
Focuses on practical real estate actions such as buying a home, selling property, renting agreements, lease terms, and negotiation tips. It provides guidance for individuals making real estate decisions.
Tenant-screening company RentGrow agreed to a proposed order that includes a $2.25 million civil penalty over federal allegations about inaccurate or incomplete background reports. The order awaits judicial approval and does not create a consumer refund fund, but the case matters because an extra eviction or criminal entry can change a housing decision even when…
More than 444,000 renters who paid hidden fees to the nation’s largest single-family landlord are getting money back. The Federal Trade Commission has begun mailing 444,131 checks totaling more than $47.2 million to consumers who were charged undisclosed fees by Invitation Homes between January 2021 and September 2024, according to an FTC announcement. Recipients who…
Evictions in New York City have risen to their highest level in years, a stark measure of how far the city’s affordability crisis has spread as rents hover near record highs. The pace has quickened enough that housing advocates now warn the recovery from the pandemic-era eviction pause has tipped into something harsher for the…
The share of income the typical American renter spends on rent has edged down to its lowest level in years, a rare piece of encouraging news in a housing market that has delivered mostly bad headlines. The improvement is modest, and it does not undo the affordability strains that built up during the pandemic, but…
Renters searching for a one-bedroom apartment in New York City now face a median asking price above $4,000 a month, a threshold the city had never hit before. The milestone, recorded in lease data compiled by Miller Samuel for Douglas Elliman, lands at a moment when vacancy rates remain near historic lows and new housing…
A record 22.7 million renter households spent more than 30 percent of their income on housing costs in 2024, the highest total ever recorded by the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies. The figure landed even as some rental markets showed signs of softening, with vacancy rates ticking upward and asking rents flattening in several…
Prospective homeowners trying to break into the market face a measurement problem that shapes the policies and programs designed to help them. The widely cited figure that first-time buyers accounted for 35% of recent home sales comes from industry survey data, but a separate federal framework for tracking these buyers produces a different picture. The…
More than 444,131 renters who leased homes from Invitation Homes, the country’s largest single-family rental landlord, are receiving refund checks from the Federal Trade Commission totaling more than $47.2 million. The payments, distributed on March 11, 2026, cover mandatory fees that the FTC says were hidden from tenants between January 2021 and September 2024. According…
Renters searching for an apartment in Manhattan now face a median asking price above $5,000 a month, a threshold the borough has never crossed before. The record arrives alongside a citywide rental vacancy rate that fell to just 1.4 percent, according to the 2023 Housing and Vacancy Survey conducted for the NYC Department of Housing…
Renters searching for a one-bedroom apartment in San Francisco now face advertised prices that have crossed a threshold no previous market cycle reached. The typical one-bedroom asking rent in the city has topped $4,000 a month for the first time, according to the MTC/ABAG Vital Signs indicator that tracks advertised rents across the Bay Area….