Rental Vacancy Rose to 7.6% in the Third Quarter as Homeowner Vacancy Held Steady
New Census figures show a higher share of vacant rental housing than a year earlier, while the apparent rise in homeownership was not statistically significant.
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The Estate Wire — real estate news for November 7, 2026
Rents Have Risen Seven Months Straight and Are Still Below Last Year
Mortgage Rates Jumped 19 Basis Points in a Single Week to 6.95%
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Lodging REITs Returned 42.8% in the First Half While Apartment REITs Managed 8.3%
Illustrative residential architecture; not a property discussed in the article.
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Construction Spending Rises for a Second Month Even as It Trails Last Year
Census Bureau data show August outlays climbing on a residential rebound, but total spending remains below year-ago levels for an eighth straight month.
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Lennar Delivered More Homes and Earned Less Doing It
Deliveries rose 2% in the quarter to May 31 while gross margin fell more than two points and net earnings dropped by a third.
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One in Five D.R. Horton Buyers Walked Away Last Quarter
The nation's largest homebuilder closed 4% more homes at a 2% lower average price, and its cancellation rate climbed to 20%.
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Berkshire Hathaway Closed Its $6.8 Billion Purchase of Taylor Morrison in Eight Weeks
The deal folds a top-five public homebuilder into Clayton Properties Group and gives Berkshire a national site-built platform.
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Dream Finders Agreed to Buy Beazer Homes for $2.2 Billion at 0.8 Times Book
The all-cash deal would create the country's sixth-largest homebuilder and prices Beazer below the stated value of its assets.
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Cavco's Manufactured-Housing Backlog Grew More Than 50% While Its Margin Shrank
Record shipments lifted revenue 9.5%, but factory-built gross margin fell nearly two points and pre-tax income dropped 15%.
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Champion Homes Closed Its Fiscal Year at $2.7 Billion in Sales as Quarterly Profit Fell
Annual revenue rose 7.3% and adjusted EBITDA 8.1%, but fourth-quarter net income dropped 18.4% and backlog ended the year lower.
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A Prefab Concrete Maker Broke Ground on 110 Acres in Arizona to Triple Its Capacity
Clark Pacific's Coolidge plant is aimed at data centres, parking structures and advanced manufacturing rather than housing.
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Builder Confidence Ticked Up to 35 in August, Still the Longest Sub-40 Streak Since 2012
The NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index rose a point after two down months, even as Census data showed new-home sales falling and unsold inventory rising in July.
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PulteGroup Sold More Homes Than It Closed as Revenue Fell 11%
Net new orders rose 6% in the June quarter while closings dropped 8%, and the average price on a closing fell to $544,000.
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NVR's Earnings Fell 29% Even as New Orders Rose 9%
The builder's cancellation rate improved to 15% while average order prices fell 5%, in a quarter that showed volume and price pulling in opposite directions.
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KB Home's Revenue Fell a Fifth, and Its Backlog Rose for the First Time in Four Years
Deliveries dropped 19% in the quarter ended August 31, but the builder ended the period with more homes under contract than a year earlier.
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Residential Construction Spending Fell Again in July as Nonresidential Edged Up
Census put total construction spending at a $2.16 trillion annual rate, with single-family value put in place down 6.5% from a year earlier.
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Framing Lumber Sat 8.8% Above a Year Earlier as Duties on Canadian Imports Were Cut
Lumber traded at $524.55 per thousand board feet in mid-September, below its August level but well above last year's, while the combined tariff rate on Canadian softwood fell to about 35.9%.
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The Smallest Builders Reported Material Cost Increases Five Times Those of the Largest
Builders starting five or fewer homes a year reported a median 9.1% rise in material costs; those starting more than 100 reported 1.8%.
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Architecture Billings Have Now Declined for Nearly Three and a Half Years
The July index read 46.6, extending a contraction that began in 2022, with multifamily residential among the weakest sectors.
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May Housing Starts Fell 15.4% From April, One of the Sharpest Monthly Declines of 2026
The Census Bureau and HUD put May starts at a 1,177,000 annual rate. Unlike most monthly moves in this series, the decline was large enough to clear its own confidence interval.
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A Third of Builders Cut Prices in June as Sentiment Held in the Mid-30s
NAHB's Housing Market Index came in at 35, with the average reported price reduction at 6% and roughly six in ten builders using some form of incentive.
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Builder Sentiment Slipped to 34 in July, With Buyer Traffic the Weakest Component
NAHB's three sub-indices diverged sharply — present sales in the high 30s, expectations in the low 40s, and prospective buyer traffic in the low 20s.
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Housing Starts and Permits Both Slipped in August as Completions Fell Sharply
Census and HUD recorded 1.275 million annualized starts in August, but the steeper story was a 27.1% annual collapse in completions.
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