Cleveland Hits 1.2 Months of Supply as Midwest Tightens, Sun Belt Loosens

Freddie Mac (Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation, FHLMC) is a government-sponsored enterprise (GSE) that purchases mortgages from lenders, packages them into securities, and sells them to investors. Along with Fannie Mae, it supports the conventional mortgage market for 1–4 unit residential properties.

Fannie Mae (Federal National Mortgage Association) is a government-sponsored enterprise that buys conforming mortgages from lenders, packages them into mortgage-backed securities, and sells them to investors on the secondary market. This recycling of capital allows lenders to issue new loans continuously — keeping residential credit available and rates lower than they would otherwise be.

APR (Annual Percentage Rate) is the total annualized cost of a loan expressed as a percentage, incorporating both the interest rate and lender fees — origination charges, discount points, broker fees — spread across the full loan term. Mandated by the Truth in Lending Act, it gives borrowers a standardized number that's always higher than or equal to the stated interest rate.

AFFO (Adjusted Funds from Operations) is a REIT financial metric that refines FFO by subtracting recurring maintenance capital expenditures and straight-line rent adjustments to show the cash a REIT truly has available to sustain its dividend.

A spread is the numerical difference between two rates or yields — most commonly the gap between real estate cap rates and 10-year Treasury yields, or between mortgage rates and benchmark interest rates. Investors read spreads as a signal of whether real estate is attractively priced, fairly valued, or dangerously expensive relative to risk-free alternatives.

Pending Home Sales tracks the number of homes that have signed purchase contracts but have not yet closed, serving as a forward-looking indicator of where closed sales will land 30–60 days later. The National Association of Realtors publishes the Pending Home Sales Index (PHSI) monthly, benchmarked to 2001 contract levels, where 100 equals the baseline volume from that year.

Months of supply is a real estate market metric that measures how long it would take to sell every currently active listing if no new properties entered the market, calculated by dividing active listings by the number of homes closed in a given month.

Zillow is the largest residential real estate platform in the United States, known for its Zestimate automated property valuations, the Zillow Home Value Index (ZHVI), rental listing data, and market trend tools that investors use for initial property research, rent estimation, and comparable sales analysis.

Framing is the structural skeleton of a building — the assembly of wood or metal studs, joists, rafters, and headers that defines every wall, floor, and roof plane. It is the first visible stage of construction after foundation work, and the phase that locks in a property's layout for decades to come.

The Consumer Price Index (CPI) measures the average change in prices paid by urban consumers for a fixed basket of goods and services — including housing, food, transportation, and medical care — over time. It is the most widely used gauge of inflation in the United States, published monthly by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

BiggerPockets is the largest online community and education platform for real estate investors in the United States. Founded in 2004, it combines a discussion forum, podcast network, blog, property calculators, and a marketplace under one roof. Most content is free, with a paid Pro membership for advanced tools.

The mortgage rate is the interest rate charged on a real estate loan—typically the 30-year fixed rate for residential—driven by federal-funds-rate, yield-curve, and interest-rate-cycle, affecting leverage, DSCR, and cap-rate.

Median home price is the middle value of recent home sales in an area—half sold for more, half for less—used to gauge affordability and market values.

Inflation is the rate at which the purchasing power of money declines over time—prices rise, so a dollar buys less. Measured by indices like CPI; historically 2–3% annually in the U.S.

Appreciation is the increase in a property's value over time — from market forces like inflation, population growth, and demand, or from investor action like renovations (which is forced appreciation).

ROI (return on investment) is the percentage you earn when you divide your profit by the total amount you invested—for every dollar you put in, how many cents come back.

A mortgage is a loan used to purchase real estate, with the property serving as collateral—if you stop paying, the lender can foreclose and sell the property to recover their money.