>
Article snippet: HOUSTON — For six months, Sue and Roger Powell have been hoping to find a buyer for their 7,100-square-foot home in the Houston suburb of Katy. A week ago, after they waded out of it with a few suitcases on air mattresses, those hopes had largely faded. Then they got an unexpected call from their real estate agent: a house hunter was interested. “Somebody actually called her before we got back in here,” Sue Powell said as she stood in her driveway last week, a safety mask around her neck and a pile of her possessions on the curb. “I was really surprised,” said her husband, describing how they had “gondoliered” their way back home over Labor Day weekend. “I didn’t think anyone would be interested for years.” But interest is rarely lacking here. The Houston metropolitan area grows by about 400 people a day and builds 40,000 housing units a year, making it the nation’s largest new-housing market, with 7 percent of residential construction. With light regulation and a civic model tied to growth, it has kept housing prices low by building everywhere and anywhere, and fast. “You have a country that’s divided between high cost places like Bay Area and New York and higher unemployment areas like Detroit, and places like Houston pick up the slack,” said Issi Romem, chief economist at BuildZoom, a San Francisco company that helps homeowners find contractors. And even after Hurricane Harvey revealed the city’s vulnerability to catastrophic flooding, leaving thousands displa... Link to the full article to read more