Technology

Sign of the Times: Even Homebuilders Prefer to Rent 

You know it’s bad when a home builder is forced to sell its own properties — the model homes it uses to attract buyers — and sign leases on them instead. In the midst of a boom in residential mortgage refinancing activity and recent efforts to stave off foreclosures through voluntary modification programs and foreclosure moratoriums, it sounds reasonable that struggling home owners are either refinancing out of their current mortgages or getting out of the home owning sector and back into the renter’s market in order to make ends meet.