Estimating Construction Costs

Here is a list of great construction cost estimation books.

Direct link to Means construction estimation books.

The Statistical Abstract of the United States has a really cool PDF that shows you housing starts, types of housing built, and the cost of materials (among other things.)

Austin and Affordable Housing

Here is an article that basically lays out a case that Austin housing affordability is not a problem for most people, is a natural consequence of capitalism, and is a desirable thing for the city's tax base.

You may or may not agree but the article is presented here.

Housing Starts and Building Permits

Housing starts (well, technically, building permits) by US Metro areas can be found here.

I like how they include counties and smaller cities as well. Oh yeah - "they" are the US Census Bureau.

Here's the link to the main Census New Residential Construction Page. There is a helpful explanation of methodology and a few other categories like Quarterly Starts by Purpose and Design.

Value of Land

Some cool land value stats for ya.

The Lincoln Institute of Land Policy has information on the following:

• The ratio of rents to prices for the stock of all owner-occupied housing;
• Values and price indexes for all land, structures, and housing in residential use;
• Values of homes, structures, and land in residential use, and land and home price indexes for 50 states and the District of Columbia; and
• Values and price indexes for land, structures, and housing for single-family owner-occupied housing units in 46 major U.S. metropolitan areas.

Now Here's some Texas-centric land value information (from Texas A&M):

Find out trends of value in average Texas farmland/acreage.

Where's My Mortgage?

Click this link to find out who owns your mortgage - and if they can produce the note. It's always helpful to live in a society that requires documents and proof rather than just having strangers show up and tell you to get out of your house.

Please see the book review about Hernando de Soto's: The Mystery of Capital: Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and Fails Everywhere Else about why the rule of law and equal protection before the law is critical to capitalism's success.

How Texas Avoided the Real Estate Meltdown

Less than 6% of Texas mortgages are in foreclosure: the national average is 10%. 19% of Texas subprime loans were bust - almost the lowest rate in the country (numbers taken from the article linked below)

True, Texas is relatively unscathed by the recent economic troubles. But what's really interesting is the WHY of how most mortgage holders stayed solvent.

According to this article in Slate, it has to do with sane state government regulation of cash-out and home equity loans. You can't borrow crazy amounts of money against your home equity.

In fact, this provision is in the state constitution.

Aw, who are we kidding. The answer is we have Chuck Norris!

Underwater Mortgages in Austin and Texas

Good question today: How many home mortgages in the Austin area are underwater (i.e. people owe more than the house is worth)?

The standard figures, from an organization called American CoreLogic, has come up with a report that is cited by several newspapers and business newspapers.

It includes the top 50 metropolitan areas by underwater status.

I would have put the report up in PDF form, but you must register for free beforehand, and I don't want to step on anybody's toes over at American CoreLogic.