As would be expected with new housing starts down, those in the construction business are fewer in number. This comes from the Business First of Louisville. Construction employment in Kentucky declined to 61,600 in July of this year, a 7.9 percent decline compared with July 2009, when the state had 72,400 employed in construction work, the Associated General Contractors of America reported.

Anyone who's been paying attention to the housing market (or has checked out our Housing Reports) has seen what's happened to home sales here in Louisville. For most of 2010 numbers showed great improvement over last year. Then came July. A couple weeks later we see some of the conventional news outlets noticing the major downturn is present nationally as well. Sales of previously occupied homes in the United States fell 27 percent in July, the weakest showing in 15 years, the National Association of Realtors said Tuesday. It was the largest monthly drop in the four decades that records

The following is a guest post by Lewis Andrews who works for MortgageFit.com—a Web site that helps consumers learn more about mortgage options and find loan specialists. Online mortgage calculators can help prospective home buyers determine the appropriate amount to spend on a new Louisville home. “How much can I afford to spend on a house” is a relevant question that comes into the mind of thousands of homebuyers all over the world. To answer this question, the home affordability calculators offered by multiple lenders play an important role. When you are going to buy a n

Maybe it's because one of my clients is planning a big kitchen remodel. Maybe it's because I watch altogether way too much HGTV. Whatever the reason, I've been thinking about all the great options are available to you, if you're planning a Louisville home remodel. Great Ideas in Kitchen Appliances This attractive range vent rises with a touch of a button then recedes when you don't want it there. Some of newest ideas involve upgrading appliances to state-of-the-art versions of our daily kitchen workhorses. There are high-end ranges, refrigerators and more from companies like Jenn-A

Just read about the Grundfos Comfort System as a great way to save money on your water bill. Less expensive than tankless water heaters and works with your existing set up. As he explained, the Grundfos pump is really quite simple. As the hot water in your pipes cool, the pump kicks in to recirculate that water back to the water heater using the cold water line and heats it back up. This continual flow keeps hot water at you finger tips so that you do not have to run the shower for a long time waiting for the water to heat. Sounds like a smart idea!

Most of the focus on last week's Louisville market reports was the big drop in home sales. This occurred in almost every area. But it should also be noted that the home price trend line improved in 10 out of 15 Louisville MLS areas. Now we hear that we're seeing this trend nationally as well. Home prices rose in nearly two-thirds of U.S. cities this spring. The national median price in April-to-June period was $176,900, up from $174,200 a year earlier. I continue to maintain that now is a great time for certain people to be buying a new home. The first condition is stable employment. Onc

Michelle Singletary of the Washington Post writes in In real estate, only smartest, best-informed will survive the following paragraph. I'm sure that many real estate professionals will take exception to Glink's observation. But the evidence is on her side. The housing market collapsed because far too many borrowers were uninformed, ill-prepared and overly optimistic about potential gain because of bad information they received and gladly embraced. I think Ms. Singletary leaves out the integral, less complimentary reason why the market collapsed. Put simply, greed. Too many buyers bought

Below you'll find our eight monthly reports for the following Louisville housing markets. These charts display Louisville home sales and Louisville median home values with a trend line. Each chart relates directly to an "area" as defined by the Louisville MLS. Well, it's official. Sales volume has dropped drastically across the board for the month of July, when compared to June 2010 and July 2009. See what this means for your home area. Monthly Reports Area 2: Butchertown/Highlands/Germantown Home values continue their upward trend in this area while sales volume for July drop

One of the great projects that our Home Builders Association of Louisville (HBAL) does for citizens in our area is their Tour of Remodeled Homes. This tour takes place on August 14th and 15th and tickets are $10. For more info, head over to their site and learn about 22 builders who have participated in this year's event. Let's hope the weather cools down, otherwise make sure to bring lots of cold water.

This post comes to you from James Kelley of VA Benefit Blog. A law school student at the University of Missouri, James Kelley works to educate the public on government financing options for home purchases. James works for USDAloans.com, the premier source for achieving your dreams with a USDA loan. The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) supports specific home loans. These are called VA Loans and are available to veterans or active duty service members wishing to purchase a home. Since its inception, the VA loan program has helped nearly 18 million veterans and active duty service men and w

The following Louisville real estate MLS areas are updated quarterly. These are now current with July data. As you might be able to discern, July was not a good month for most of these areas from a real estate perspective. While interest rates remain historically low, most are content to stand pat rather than make a move. Quarterly Reports Area 0: Central Downtown District/Old Louisville Values remain steady as home sales drop to previous year level. Area 1: Downtown/Old Lou./Shively/West Lou./Butchertown Home prices improve slightly but transactions drop by more than half.

Closets by Design is one of many home-focused businesses that are based in the newly, redesigned Westport Village. I had a chance to sit down and chat with Amelia Presler of Closets by Design to learn more about their products and how they might fit into today's Louisville home improvement environment. Question: Hi Amelia! Thanks for chatting with me today. To begin, tell me a little about your company. Answer: Well, Closets by Design offers national backing but our franchise is locally owned and our manufacturing facility is here so that we can offer the local support you need.

Most of our posts here at LouisvilleHomesBlog are directed to buyers of Louisville homes or sellers looking for real estate news and advice. This post is not. It is directed towards Realtors® who want their voice to be heard in our nation's capital. One of the big fund-raising events of 2010 will be on September 9th at Locust Creek Clubhouse. Buying a ticket will contribute the our Political Action Committee (PAC) called GLARPAC. Just rolls off the tongue, doesn't it? It just stands for the Greater Louisville Association of Realtors Political Action Committee. Maybe this piece of news

A recent stock rally report caught my eye due to the real estate component. Keep in mind, this is a national report, not keyed specifically to the Louisville real estate market. A report on the housing market, while still showing a slowdown, was reassuring because it wasn't as bad as investors expected. The National Association of Realtors said sales of previously occupied homes fell to an annual rate of 5.37 million in June from 5.66 million a month earlier. Economists forecast the sales rate to fall to 5.18 million.

Museum Plaza from Brooklyn Digital Foundry on Vimeo. Hat tip to Branden Klayko over at Broken Sidewalk (great site) for bringing this amazing video to my mind again. I'm not sure if I've posted it before but even if I have, it's worth a second look. Here's hoping they are able to secure funding for the Museum Plaza project.

Here you see the entry into Shakes Run for Homearama 2010 Just a reminder, Homearma 2010 runs from July 10th to the 25th. So that means there are only a few days left for you to visit this great event. I recently visited Louisville's new home showcase on a hot and humid Saturday afternoon. Other than the sweltering heat, it was great fun. (At least for an avid new home junkie, like myself.) Rather than try and describe each home's great features, I thought I'd write about the current trends that I see in these new upscale homes and then cover a few of the innovations that I found i

Houses like this great ranch home in Douglass Hills are quite affordable when compared with the nation as a whole. The Forbes.com Web site confuses me. I know they're trying to have more pages, so each page can have more ads, thus more ad revenue, but as far as navigating it, I always find it frustrating. But what's not frustrating is that Forbes' analysts are high on Louisville real estate. So much so that again this year they rank our fair city quite high—4th in the country, in fact. Just last November, Francesca Levy had Louisville at #17 in her Best Bang-For-The-Buck Cities, w

Just how low can you go?Just days after I post Mortgage Rates Lowest in 40 Years we see a national story touch the same topic with Mortgage rates remain at lowest level in decades. (Think the AP is shadowing me?) The last time home loan rates were lower was the 1950s, when most mortgages lasted just 20 or 25 years. That's amazing. But here's the part I find difficult to believe. Rates could go lower and still not budge the housing market, analysts say. That's because a person without a job can't afford a home and a person worried about losing their job is unlikely to do so either.

Just a quick note to let you know there are only 10 days left for this year's Homearama. Remember to bring water and maybe a hat, it's hot out there folks!

See how home improvement dollars are being spent on different parts of the home. (Click to enlarge.) The fine folks at Fixr have updated their Home Improvement graphic with new numbers. I believe it's interesting to see how the highs of 2007 have been dropping even as home sales have dropped at the same time. This says that most consumers aren't very optimistic about the direction of our economy. If you're a Louisville home owner, feel free to click on our Home Improvement category for all the posts related to improving your Louisville home.