October 27, 2026 | Michael Belfor Buying a home is getting so expensive that more younger buyers are bringing Mom and Dad into the mortgage. ⠀ A new Rocket analysis found that 3.3% of homebuyers under age 35 co-applied for a mortgage with someone over age 55 in 2025. ⠀ That was up from 2.5% in 2019. Barron's ⠀ And NAR says first-time buyers now make up just 21% of all purchases — the lowest share it has recorded since 1981. National Association of REALTORS® ⠀ Translation: ⠀ T

Inheriting your parents' home sounds straightforward. Mom or Dad passes away. The house transfers through their estate or trust. The family decides whether to keep it or sell it. But there's a situation that can make that process much more time-sensitive: The house has a reverse mortgage. A recent Realtor.com story highlighted something many adult children don't know until they're already dealing with the death of a parent: inheriting a home with a reverse mortgage ca

A house in California can mean three completely different things depending on who is standing in front of it. To a local family, it is a place to raise their kids. To a second-home buyer, it might be weekends at the beach. To an investor, it could be an income-producing property with hundreds of potential nightly rental opportunities each year. All three buyers may want the exact same house. And in California's coastal, mountain and vacation communities, that competition rais

Here's one of the strangest problems in real estate. You can have hundreds of thousands—or even millions—of dollars in home equity... And still feel broke when you find the house you want to buy. Why? Because equity isn't cash. You can't walk into escrow and say: “Don't worry. There's $600,000 sitting inside my house.” Escrow is going to want actual funds. And that's where move-up buyers get stuck. They have the wealth. They have the income. They've found the house. But a hug