By Jann Swanson | Mortgage News Daily
The affordability tug-of-war between home prices and interest rates continued in the third quarter, but the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) said this time prices won. Home price appreciation, which continued pretty much unabated in the quarter, offset a small decline in rates and the NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Opportunity Index (HOI), a measure of housing affordability, moved slightly lower.
The HOI quantifies the percentage of homes in the U.S. that are affordable to families with the median income of 65,700. In all, 61.4 percent of new and existing homes sold during the third quarter were affordable, down from 62.0 percent in Q2.
