We’ve all witnessed the remarkable rebound in real estate values—and last week, the scale of that recovery was the subject of a CNBC commentary. “A growing number of homeowners are in the money,” it found; then, “Homeowners are sitting on trillions in tappable home equity.” Trillions? That’s a number that sounds quite impressive—but also hard to grasp. To get a handle on the scale of the nation’s real estate recovery in terms that are more meaningful to Charlotte readers, it calls for some imagination. Here’s a try: If you think of a $345,000 home (today’s U.S. average)—and then of a neighborhood with 30 … (3 comments)
We often discuss the difference in family wealth between homeowner households and renter households. Much of that difference is the result of the equity buildup that homeowners experience over the time that they own their home. In a report recently released by the nonpartisan Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI), they reveal how valuable equity can be in retirement planning. Craig Copeland, Senior Research Associate at EBRI, recently authored a report, Importance of Individual Account Retirement Plans and Home Equity in Family Total Wealth, in which he reveals: “Individual account retirement plan assets, plus home equity, represent almost all of what families have to use for retirement expenses outside of Social Security and traditional … (2 comments)
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