A creative new learning space is coming to Detroit’s District 5. The name of the space is Kraftologie and it is a place for inclusive, hands-on crafting.
Owner Trice Clark is able to bring her vision to life because of a $100,000 grant from the Comerica Hatch Detroit contest by Tech Town. Hatch Detroit is an organization that supports small businesses and encourages residents to vote on what businesses they want in their neighborhood. Clark beat out three other finalists in the May 13 Hatch-Off that followed weeks of public voting and live pitches from the four finalists. More than 30,000 votes were cast in this year’s competition.
This contest has been going on for more than 15 years and past winners included dining restaurant Baobab Fare, Sister Pie and Batch Brewing Company. For more information go to hatchdetroit.com.
Additional headlines for Friday, May 15, 2026
Senior housing community ready for residents
The former Lewis College of Business campus was reborn into a senior housing community. The long vacant landmark located on Detroit’s northwest side is now the Dr. Violet T Lewis Village, named after the American businesswoman and educator who founded the school in 1928. This affordable senior housing has 105 units and is for residents 55 and older.
The project is a mix of historic preservation with new build and will help supply a housing market that’s experiencing a shortage. The village is fully income-restricted, serving households at roughly 30% to 80% of area median income, or about $20,000 to $70,000 per year. Developers say the project is designed to help longtime Detroit residents age in place and expands affordable housing for seniors.
Sports
MLB
The Detroit Tigers fell to the New York Mets again with the score 4-9. It doesn’t help that the Mets are the last place team in the National League East.
The Tigers now look to bounce back this weekend against the Toronto Blue Jays with a three game affair at Comerica Park. First pitch for today’s game is at 6:45 p.m.
NBA
And the Pistons face elimination in Game 6 of their series against the Cleveland Caviliers. The hometown heroes will potentially have to face Donovan Mitchell and James Harden without sharpshooter guard Duncan Robinson due to lower back soreness.
Game 6 in Rocket Arena will be one to watch. Tip-off is at 7:00 p.m.
Soccer
Detroit City FC face off against Forward Madision FC as part of the USL Cup. The game starts tomorrow at 6 p.m.
NFL
Detroit Lions defensive end Myles Adams is showing up to the Salvation Army’s upcoming sports pop-up event at the Rochester Hills thrift store.
The one-day-only pop-up will showcase hand-selected sports inventory like jerseys, athletic apparel and Detroit fan gear allat thrift store prices.
Adams spent the majority of the 2025 season on the team’s practice squad and was resigned this offseason because of the positive impression he left on Head coach Dan Campbell’s practice squad.
‘Martin’ tour
And the Distinctively Detroit Tour is bringing you 90s sitcom nostalgia with Wazzup, Detroit! If you are a fan of the show Martin and the show’s Detroit’s ties, this is for you!
The tour will start at the William V. Banks Broadcast Museum where the star character Martin stepped into the world of broadcasting. The museum is the former WGPR building. Then the tour will go to Martin’s former apartment at the Garden Court Apartments. For more information go to distinctivelydetroit.com. This is all going down tomorrow May 16 from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
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At its peak, the city of Highland Park was described as a model city with more than 60,000 residents and the housing stock to hold it. Today, the population is less than 9,000 and neighborhoods are plagued with blighted and abandoned properties.
But city officials see an opportunity to rebuild the housing stock and population. Carlton Clyburn is the Director of Community and Economic Development in Highland Park. He spoke with WDET’s Bre’Anna Tinsley as part of our Crossing the Lines – Highland Park series. Clyburn says the city’s rebirth will start with building what he calls “the missing middle.”
Listen: Highland Park wants to build the ‘missing middle’ to address housing shortage
This interview has been edited for clarity and length.
Carlton Clyburn: So, the missing middle are your duplexes, triplexes, fourplexes. What that does… it brings more families in, right? But also, it helps with development costs. So, if you got a 2, 000 square foot home single family, it’s going to cost you the same as a 2,000 square foot duplex. The difference is you can get double rent or double the cost for your return on sale if it’s a duplex. And it fits, it matches some of the people that’s living out of wanting to get out of like apartment living, or looking to start a family those kind of things. So we’re really looking to fill in that missing middle gap.
Bre’Anna Tinsley: Okay, and so you said you just updated the master plan—
CC: No, we just created our economic development strategy. We’re in process. We were going to do some updates to our master plan, because we need to do some things with our zoning. And the new requirement from the state is to do a housing assessment.
I mean, you could kind of look and as we’re planning out the city, we got a couple areas where we’re looking at all market, single family, right? But we have a lot of areas where we can build out, and that’s what we’ll be looking at that missing middle.
BT: I want to talk about the water bill situation that has been like a big thing in Highland Park—and correct me if I’m wrong, if I get any of these numbers and figures wrong. But it started with a $54 million debt correct?
CC: Made up. Made up debt.
BT: And then the state, and then the state came in and provided, I think, about $30 million to help rebuild the infrastructure, which brought some of that debt down. Is that correct?
CC: So we have been overcharged by GLWA for years, since they started. They didn’t want to abide by us. So, they said, “no, we want to charge you more.” Part of that agreement was us putting meters in the ground. Okay? We have put meters in the ground, and we’ve already found a $1.5 million reduction. So, they’re still overcharging us.
The rate that Highland Park pays is comparable to what Wayne County pays, and that’s 43 communities, you see. So we’re being greatly overcharged, but by us putting these meters down, by us providing the data, somethings got to give now. I mean, we told y’all we was being overcharged. Y’all owe us some money. We need relief.
Because you’re right. That’s another thing that will keep the developers away. So you know, the timing is everything, because that gives you know, that gave us opportunity to start working on our plan, our economic development strategy, updates to the master plan, and while the water folks are battling that water deal, then we can put these plans into action.
BT: What about what residents are doing to rehab their own homes? Are there any resources available to them? Is the city looking to provide any resources to them?
CC: So right now we do have ongoing grants, like through the HOME program and some of the other programs, but… they’re more so for [ages] 60 and over. So, I’m looking for more monies for not 60 and over, right? Because we do have families in need for home repair.
And, you know, the developers I talked to about moving forward, or, “Hey, we built this block out, and it’s a few homes we got to find money for, you know, rehab for them as well.” Maybe not so much interior, but at least exterior, because the last thing we want is somebody you know to come in and build this neighborhood up and leave three or four houses looking like they look when we could pull money like a community benefits. I mean, if you’re pulling money out, give them, give them four houses, $5,000 a piece. Or, send your contractors over there to see, you know, what could be done within a scope to bring them up as well. So, I’m conscious of it.
BT: You might have mentioned it earlier, at the beginning of the conversation, but knocking down homes, there’s a lot of blighted properties. Where’s the city at with demoing more of the dilapidated buildings?
CC: We have $5 million worth of demolition happening, right? And that’s pretty much going to take our inventory out the state. Most of their properties are demoed. The county, most of them are demoed. They’re finishing up some more demo. The issue are the privately owned blighted properties that we do have nuisance abatement orders on. We are looking to, you know, hold negligent property owners accountable. It’s just a little bit longer process.
Highland Towers
BT: Highland Towers is coming down soon. Is there any plans to put, like, more housing there? Or what do you know, what the city is looking at?
CC: I would look so that’s something I’m talking to the county about, because we did have to transfer ownership. Oh, and Highland Towers was a privately owned property that we took through our nuisance abatement ordinance, and the county has money, so we transferred it to the county to knock down. So they’ll be knocking it down, and we’ll work with them on [a request for proposal] or what kind of development we want to see. But we probably want to see, you know, residential, retail, mixed use, something similar, just something creative like this, going up and down Woodward, and what’s in Brush Park.
You know, Brush Park is what I’m really a fan of, because it has a lot of the old bones. But you got this new stuff, you got the old stuff. That’s a good mix. And, when I saw what was going on in Brush Park years ago, I’m like, this is, this is what we can do in Highland Park.
BT: You mentioned the housing shortage, homelessness, do you think is that enough to drive people to Highland Park when the homes are available?
CC: I believe so. Yes. Because, like I say, with the Greenway, us being on Woodward, Davidson, 75, the Lodge, logistically, it makes sense. You got everything, what, three, four miles. You got all the field, all the sports teams right up the street. It is, logistically speaking, good luck.
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Highland Park is a small city that once had a relatively large population for its size. At the height of Detroit’s automotive boom, more than 50,000 people lived within Highland Park’s 2.9 square miles. Today, the population is less than 9,000.
WDET’s Crossing the Lines series features conversations with and stories about Highland Park’s people, culture, and history.
Detroit Public Radio’s Citizen Vox project gives residents a chance to express how they feel about their communities and the issues that matter to them.
WDET’s Pat Batcheller spoke with Highland Park resident Ken Bates at a coffee shop on Woodward Ave. on April 10, 2026.
Listen: Highland Park resident says smart planning can reduce poverty
Bates was born in Detroit but moved to Highland Park with his wife more than 25 years ago. They bought a Craftsman-style bungalow in a historic district of the city. Voters elected Bates to the city council in 2018, where he served until 2022. He chairs the board of an energy nonprofit called Soulardarity. Its mission includes installing solar-powered streetlights in Highland Park’s neighborhoods.
Bates shares his thoughts on housing, poverty, community pride, and development.
Ken Bates: We know that there’s a housing crisis, a housing shortage nationally, affordable housing. Highland Park has an abundance of land that is underutilized, that really could be put forth in terms of development. So, we could look at land trusts. We could look at affordable housing, low-income housing, market rate housing, duplexes to grow the population because that’s what we have in abundance.
Manufacturing? I doubt that will ever come back to the extent that Henry Ford and Chrysler and some of the other manufacturers had here. That’s a bygone era.
And so, we have to look into the future as to what will help Highland Park become sustainable. What kind of industries should we count on?
You have to get education on board. You have to get private development. You have to get your government funding all in order, and you have to have a plan and a vision and the expertise in order to do it.
If not, you’re just maintaining the status quo. And year after year, you’re just one disaster away from some financial calamity, whether it be a natural disaster or something like the Great Lakes Water Authority suing us for $19 million and threatening to put it on our tax rolls.
Pat Batcheller: What do you like about being in Highland Park?
KB: Highland Park is centrally located. It’s convenient. There’s a sense of—like with my block, I never expected it to be so diverse. And yet you’ve got immigrants, you’ve got people of different faiths. You’ve got people who are ascribed to different lifestyles. I mean, it just it goes on and on, different political beliefs, and we all live together in the same community, and we’re able to communicate and talk and look out after each other.”
PB: From the conversations I’ve had with you and some of the other folks I’ve talked to, it isn’t really the borders that define Highland Park, it’s the people. Would you agree with that?
KB: Well, yeah, I would say the people do define Highland Park because, because again, they’ve been here. Most have been here quite a long time. And even if you travel outside of Highland Park and talk to people that formerly lived here, many people will tell you, ‘Yeah, my grandparents lived here.’ They remember it as a great city. They’ve had fond memories.
The historical district is obviously something that has gained attention. People are looking at those homes and, if they have the means to renovate them, are coming in and deciding, “well, let’s renovate this home.” Because you can’t rebuild those anywhere for anything that I would consider reasonable.
Highland Park has just had its own identity for a long, long time. And so, I can’t see that changing because it would be so difficult to incorporate us into the Detroit culture. We’re not Detroit. We’re not Hamtramck. We’re Highland Park.
PB: What’s the most pressing issue facing Highland Park right now?
KB: It’s poverty. You’ve got to figure out how to raise people’s incomes up, so to speak, their standard of living. So, whether it be through employment, homeownership, because poverty impacts everything around us. For example, ALDI is usually out of shopping carts because people abscond with them. If you’re running a business, that’s not helpful. We were fortunate in that Foot Locker moved into the old CVS building because CVS, Rite-Aid, and another drugstore left.
Convincing businesses to come here is a real challenge because the landscape has changed. Brick and mortar stores aren’t necessarily how people are going about retail experiences. You would think that we would have a thrift shop or something of that nature in a community like that. We don’t.
So, trying to look at trends that will allow people to be gainfully employed, increase home ownership, educate their children are things that should be made priority.
The appearance of the city has to change because we have a lot of blight. We had a press conference celebrating the announcement of Highland Towers on Woodward being torn down. We’ve got to have news that is uplifting, that is showing progress now. Yes, the building should be torn down because it’s caught on fire sixteen years ago. But we need to be announcing opportunities for growth projects that will bring about change.
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The Move Detroit coalition has launched two programs aimed at increasing the city’s population.
The first is the Make Detroit Home program, a grant program offering financial incentives to encourage entrepreneurs to bring their small businesses—and their residence—back to the city.
The program has $500,000 it can give away in forms of grants and other financial incentives.
Move Detroit CEO Hillary Doe says they are hoping to target new and returning Detroiters to the city.
“Then for the kind of returning Detroiters and the new Detroiters, the eligibility there is that your intention is to, you know, bring your residence back home. You know that you want to become a resident of our great city here, and then you can get access to those benefits, including things like up to $1,000 in relocation.”
The second is the Neighborhood Ambassador Program that seeks to nominate 100 Detroiters to help shape the city’s growth strategy.
Doe says program’s goal is to influence people to move to the city with stories and experiences shared from current residents.
“To help share their favorite local haunts, their favorite small business owners. Share stories and really be our storytellers. To share, you know, Detroit story with our city, our region and you know the country.”
Applications to nominate a resident is open. The 100 ambassadors will be chosen in June.
Additional headlines for Thursday, April 9, 2026
New strategies to enforce safe housing
Detroit’s laws, health, and building safety departments are increasing enforcement strategies to ensure safe and quality housing for renters.
The effort is anchored in three coordinated actions, joint inspections between the health and safety departments, initiating court-enforced consent agreements for properties with known persistent issues and placing liens on chronically blighted properties.
The Building Safety Engineering and Environmental Department (BSEED) has identified 60 apartment buildings with ongoing maintenance issues.
BSEED Director David Bell says the city has reached a turning point. “Apartment buildings in this city where violations pile up, repairs never happen, and families are left in conditions that no one should ever have to tolerate. This has to stop.”
Bell says the goal is to increase certificates of compliance from 14% to 35% in a year.
Workshop to tell the stories of Southwest Detroit
The University of Michigan’s School of Social Work’s Engage Project is hosting a workshop called “Detroit Voices Southwest Oral History Project.” The workshop will focus on exploring the power of community storytelling and oral history.
Participants will learn how to document their communities stories, preserve lived experiences, and use story telling as a way to foster dialogue and collective action.
The event will be held this Saturday, April 11 from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Mexicantown Community Development Center at 2835 Bagley in Detroit. Registration is not needed and lunch will be provided.
Chevrolet Malibu recall
General Motors is recalling more than a quarter-million Chevrolet Malibus to fix their rearview cameras.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says the way GM mounted the cameras could expose them to moisture that can weaken the adhesives holding them in place. That can cause distorted or blank images, increasing the risk of a crash.
The automaker says it’s not aware of any crashes or injuries. It will replace the cameras at no charge.
Listen to the latest episode of the “Detroit Evening Report” on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, NPR.org or wherever you get your podcasts.
Support local journalism.
WDET strives to cover what’s happening in your community. As a public media institution, we maintain our ability to explore the music and culture of our region through independent support from readers like you. If you value WDET as your source of news, music and conversation, please make a gift today.
Detroit Mayor Mary Sheffield recently appointed Ali Abazeed as the city’s new Chief Public Health Officer, saying he would be a part of creating a “health in all policies” approach to government.
“We’re really excited to get up and going and also to continue the good work that the department has done over the years, but also to upgrade the software of what public health can look like in the city of Detroit,” he shares.
Abazeed previously created and led the city of Dearborn’s health department. He also worked as a public health advisor at the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
Past policies shape today’s health issues
He says health is impacted by housing quality and environment. He hopes to work with the department’s staff of 280 people to create better health outcomes for Detroiters.
“The challenges that Detroit faces from a health perspective, those aren’t inevitable… they’re created by decades, if not centuries of decisions made by man, policies that have been excluding people from opportunities,” he says.
Ali Abazeed previously created and served as the Dearborn Department of Health’s Chief Public Health Officer.
Abazeed says the city focuses on a harm reduction approach by working with all city departments to connect the dots for people who live in the city. He says part of that will include having more health department officials out in the city.
“90% of your life expectancy happens in the communities where you live, learn, work, worship, play… then it requires us to take that 90% collaborative approach across everything that we do at the city,” he says.
Abazeed says Detroiters face health burdens like asthma, which he says require a multifaceted response.
He says everyone is entitled to good health.
“Understanding who has been disqualified, who has been sort of pushed to the side, and whether that’s… in Washington or Dearborn and now in Detroit, I think the work is relatively the same, even if it does take on a little bit of a different scale,” he says.
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WASHINGTON — Donald Trump’s promises on affordability in 2024 helped propel him to a second term in the White House.
Since then, Trump says, the problem has been solved: He now calls affordability a hoax perpetrated by Democrats. Yet the high cost of living, especially housing, continues to weigh heavily on voters, and has dragged down the president’s approval ratings.
In a poll conducted this month by the New York Times and Siena University, 58% of respondents said they disapprove of the way the president is handling the economy.
How the economy fares in the coming months will play an outsize role in determining whether the Democrats can build on their electoral success in 2025 and seize control of one or both chambers of Congress.
With housing costs so central to voters’ perceptions about the economy, both parties have put forward proposals in recent weeks targeting affordability. Here is a closer look at their competing plans for expanding housing and reining in costs:
How bad is the affordability crisis?
Nationwide, wages have barely crept up over the last decade — rising by 21.24% between 2014 and 2024, according to the Federal Reserve. Over the same period, rent and home sale prices more than doubled, and healthcare and grocery costs rose 71.5% and 37.35%, respectively, according to the Fed.
National home price-to-income ratios are at an all-time high, and coastal states like California and Hawaii are the most extreme examples.
Housing costs in California are about twice the national average, according to the state Legislative Analyst’s Office, which said prices have increased at “historically rapid rates” in recent years. The median California home sold for $877,285 in 2024, according to the California Assn. of Realtors, compared with about $420,000 nationwide, per Federal Reserve economic data.
California needs to add 180,000 housing units annually to keep up with demand, according to the state Department of Housing. So far, California has fallen short of those goals and has just begun to see success in reducing its homeless population, which sat at 116,000 unsheltered people in 2025.
What do the polls say?
More than two-thirds of Americans surveyed in a Gallup poll last month said they felt the economy was getting worse, and 36% expressed approval for the president — the lowest total since his second term began.
The poll found that 47% of U.S. adults now describe current economic conditions as “poor,” up from 40% just a month prior and the highest since Trump took office. Just 21% said economic conditions were either “excellent” or “good,” while 31% described them as “only fair.”
An Associated Press poll found that only 16% of Republicans think Trump has helped “a lot” in fixing cost of living problems.
What have the Democrats proposed?
The party is pushing measures to expand the supply of housing, and cut down on what they call “restrictive” single-family zoning in favor of denser development.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said Democrats plan to “supercharge” construction through bills like California Sen. Adam Schiff’s Housing BOOM Act, which he introduced in December.
Schiff said the bill would lower prices by stimulating the development of “millions of affordable homes.” The proposal would expand low-income housing tax credits, set aside funds for rental assistance and homelessness, and provide $10 billion in housing subsidies for “middle-income” workers such as teachers, police officers and firefighters.
The measure has not been heard in committee, and faces long odds in the Republican-controlled body, though Schiff said inaction on the proposal could be used against opponents.
And the Republicans?
A group of 190 House Republicans this month unveiled a successor proposal to the “Big Beautiful Bill,” the sprawling tax and spending plan approved and signed into law by Trump in July.
The Republican Study Committee described the proposal as an affordability package aimed at lowering down payments, enacting mortgage reforms and creating more tax breaks.
Leaders of the group said it would reduce the budget deficit by $1 trillion and could pass with a simple majority.
“This blueprint … locks in President Trump’s deregulatory agenda through the only process Democrats can’t block: reconciliation,” said Rep. August Pfluger, R-Texas, who chairs the group. “We have 11 months of guaranteed majorities. We’re not wasting a single day.”
Though the proposal has not yet been introduced as legislation, Republicans said it would include a mechanism to revoke funding from blue states over rent control and immigration policy, which they calculated would save $48 billion.
President Trump has endorsed a $200-billion mortgage bond stimulus, which he said would drive down mortgage rates and monthly payments. And the White House, which oversees Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac — the two enterprises that back most U.S. mortgages — continues to push the idea of portable and assumable mortgages.
Trump said the move would allow buyers to keep their existing mortgage rate or enable new homeowners to assume a previous owner’s mortgage.
The Department of Justice, meanwhile, has launched a criminal investigation into Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell over the Fed’s renovation costs, as Trump bashed him over “his never ending quest to keep interest rates high.”
The president also vowed to revoke federal funding to states over a wealth of issues such as child care and immigration policy.
“This is not about any particular policy that they think is harmful,” California Democratic Rep. Laura Friedman said. “This is about Trump’s always trying to find a way to punish blue states.”
Is there any alignment?
The two parties are cooperating on companion measures in the House and Senate.
The bipartisan ROAD to Housing Act seeks to expand housing supply by easing regulatory barriers. It passed the Senate unanimously and has support from the White House, but House Republicans have balked, and it has yet to receive a floor vote.
A bipartisan proposal — the Housing in the 21st Century Act — was approved by the House Financial Services Committee by a 50-1 vote in December. It also has yet to receive a floor vote.
The bill is similar to its twin in the Senate, with Rep. French Hill (R-Ark.) working across the aisle with Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles). If approved, it would cut permitting times, support manufactured-housing development and expand financing tools for low-income housing developers.
There was also a recent moment of unusual alignment between the president and California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who both promised to crack down on corporate home buying.
What do the experts say?
Housing experts recoiled at GOP proposals to bar housing dollars from sanctuary jurisdictions and cities that impose rent control.
“Any conditioning on HUD funding that sets up rules that explicitly carve out blue cities is going to be really catastrophic for California’s larger urban areas,” said David Garcia, deputy director of policy at UC Berkeley’s Terner Center for Housing Innovation.
More than 35 cities in California have rent control policies, according to the California Apartment Assn. The state passed its own rent stabilization law in 2019, and lawmakers approved a California sanctuary law in 2017 that prohibits state resources from aiding federal immigration enforcement.
The agenda comes on the heels of a series of HUD spending cuts, including a 30% cap on permanent housing investments and the end of a federal emergency housing voucher program that local homelessness officials estimate would put 14,500 people on the streets.
In Los Angeles County, HUD dollars make up about 28% of homelessness funding.
“It would undermine a lot of the bipartisan efforts that are happening in the House and the Senate to move evidence-backed policy to increase housing supply and stabilize rents and home prices,” Garcia said.
The president’s mortgage directives also prompted skepticism from some experts.
“Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were pressed to get into the riskier parts of the mortgage market back in the housing bubble and that was a part of the problem,” said Eric McGhee, a researcher at the Public Policy Institute of California.
An American flag flies near new home construction at a housing development in the Phoenix suburbs on June 9, 2023, in Queen Creek, Arizona. (Mario Tama/Getty Images North America/TNS)
When Kate Brouner decided to put her six-bedroom, three-bath 3,590-square-foot Howell house on the market, she called the previous owner: Novi-based Realtor Jenn Anderson.
Anderson lived in the home for 11 years before selling to Brouner.
“We call it ‘our house’ and we wanted to make sure to find the right buyer,” Anderson said.
Winter tends to be a slower time for agents but it allows real-estate agents to size up last year’s marketplace and forecast the year ahead. But houses are still being bought and sold.
Steve Stockton has a national and local perspective of the housing market. He’s a board member for RealComp, Michigan’s largest multiple-listing service; the North Oakland County Board of Realtors; and the National Real Estate Review Board.
“This is the longest time period we’ve had growth: 29 months in a row of increased value nationally,” he said. “I don’t remember a month since COVID where we haven’t gone up month over month.”
Regionally, sales rose month-over-month in the Northeast and South, were unchanged in the West, and declined in the Midwest. Demand in Michigan remains steady, Stockton said.
Nationally, home sales rose in December, up by a half percent from November, according to the National Association of Realtors. But compared to December 2024, sales were down by 1%.
The typical homebuyer is 60 years old and the median age for a new-home buyer is at an all-time high: 40, up from 33 in 2021 and 29 in 1991.
“The hardest issue is finding starter homes that younger people can buy. To finally hit 40 as the average first-time buyer’s age is just crazy,” he said.
Market shift
Stockton said the current market is transitioning from one that favored sellers to a balanced market favoring neither buyers nor sellers, aided in part by lower interest rates.
As of late Thursday, a 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage loan was around 6.2% and the 15-year rate was around 5.6%. Few expect interest to drop below 6% this year, despite pressure on the Federal Bank by the Trump administration, he said.
Karen Kage, Realcomp’s CEO and a real estate agent for more than 40 years, said buyers are finding 10% more homes for sale in southeast Michigan this year compared to last year while Oakland County has 15% more.
Oakland County’s hottest markets include Novi, Northville and South Lyon, where builders are busy. Existing homes are selling in Milford, Highland and White Lake townships, Stockton said.
Areas like Birmingham and Bloomfield Hills remain popular and lakeside homes are always in high demand.
Home prices
Southeast Michigan’s median price for existing homes was $270,000 in December, up 5.9% over December 2024. Oakland County’s median home price increased by less than 1%, to $360,000..
“The buyers have a little more to chase,” Stockton said, noting that less than five years ago, buyers were skipping home inspections and warranties to compete with a slew of other buyers.
These days, he said, softer markets in Nevada, Arizona, Idaho and Florida are inspiring older homeowners who are weighing getting a good price for their Michigan home and taking advantage of better prices in what Stockon called “the sunshine states.”
In southeast Michigan, the number of homes on the market represent about three to four months of inventory, up from 2015, when the inventory was a scant six weeks. A truly balanced market requires a five-to-seven-month supply of homes, Stockton said.
More homes for sale means sellers are now waiting on home inspection results, offering home warranties again and bargaining on prices more than in recent years.
But in some areas, buyers are writing love letters about the home they want to persuade a seller to pick their offer.
What’s selling
A refreshed kitchen remains a selling point, as does a newer roof.
“The homes selling quickly now are updated and sharp,” Stockton said. “If you have a house that’s a little tired and dated, it’s going to sit on the market for a while.”
But a motivated seller like Brouner will adjust the home price to attract buyers.
Brouner, a healthcare analyst and mother of five, wanted a new home after her divorce was finalized but didn’t have the time for significant updates.
Anderson said it’s important for sellers to be realistic about their home’s value and the marketplace. Brouner had been watching the real estate market for 18 months before deciding to list her home. She and Anderson agreed to list the house for $449,900.
Less than a week after the listing went online, offers poured in.
“I was pretty confident my house would sell but Jenn really helped me make the most money possible,” she said. “Selling is not as scary as everyone thinks. Find the right agent and they will guide you.”
Brouner will start shopping for a new home with Anderson soon. She hopes to find a house with more land, room for her family and a price under $400,000 and she’s being pragmatic about her options.
“I don’t mind buying a fixer upper,” she said.
The 2026 outlook
“I hate making predictions,” Kage said. “Everything could change tomorrow … Who could have predicted some of the things we’ve been through in the last 40 years?”
She prefers to watch monthly home-sales figures and said two months of numbers gives a short-term peek into the future. The final months of winter can suggest how a season will progress. The second-quarter market is a better indicator, she said.
The solid sellers’ market pressed buyers into bidding wars, which Kage said raised prices to a point that challenges younger buyers.
She believes more sellers are confident of getting a good price for their home and being able to find an affordable next home,” she said.
A rise in the number of homes available has increased the average time on the market by two days, to 43 days, which has alarmed sellers and it shouldn’t because buyers who have more choices are more confident in their offers, Kage said.
Kage encourages buyers and sellers to work with a licensed real estate agent. They can help sellers find the optimum price for marketing a home and typically learn about new listings before they are published.
“People say, ‘Oh, I’ll just check Zillow’ but where do you think Zillow gets the information? They get it from us,” she said.
President Donald Trump over the weekend floated an idea that took real estate agents, mortgage brokers and housing experts by surprise: the 50-year mortgage.
On Saturday, Trump posted an image on Truth Social titled “Great American Presidents.” It included a photo of President Franklin D. Roosevelt under the words “30-year mortgage” and a photo of Trump beneath the words “50-year mortgage.” (Mortgages were extended to 30 years in the 1940s as part of Roosevelt’s push to make home buying more affordable.)
Housing economists say the longer time frame could save buyers a couple hundred dollars a month, depending on the size of the mortgage and other details. But it would be costlier in other ways, including with more interest paid over a longer period of time. Implementing such a policy would also require tedious changes from regulators, plus buy-in from lenders and the broader housing finance industry.
So far, there’s little sense of how popular a 50-year mortgage would be. Here’s what we know so far.
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What has the Trump administration said?
After Trump’s Truth Social post on Saturday, Bill Pulte, the administration’s top housing finance official, posted on X that “we are indeed working on The 50 year Mortgage – a complete game changer.” Pulte is the head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency who also made himself chair of mortgage behemoths Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, companies that have been under government control since the 2008 housing crisis. Fannie and Freddie are essential to the smooth functioning of the U.S. mortgage market and together guarantee about half of existing home loans.
In a statement, a White House official who declined to be named said Trump “is always exploring new ways to improve housing affordability for everyday Americans. Any official policy changes will be announced by the White House.”
An FHFA spokesperson who also declined to be named said, “We are studying, and have not finalized, a wide variety of options related to multi year loans, including the ability to make mortgages transferable or portable. If banks can sell someone’s mortgage, we should at least explore if there are opportunities for regular Americans to have flexibility.”
One person close to the White House said the announcement came after Democrats swept in last week’s elections, in part on pledges to boost affordability for housing and more. But that person, speaking on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss it publicly, said Trump’s social media post had no substantial policy behind it yet.
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Would 50-year mortgages save buyers money?
With a longer timeline, home buyers have much more time to pay back a loan. And they would have lower monthly payments along the way. For example, let’s assume a home sells for $400,000. A buyer puts up 10 percent – or $40,000 – for a down payment. The buyer gets a 6.25 percent interest rate, slightly above last week’s 30-year fixed rate average of 6.22 percent.
That buyer would owe about $2,300 each month on a 30-year mortgage. On a 50-year loan, they would owe about $2,000. They might pay more than that, though – that math assumes a buyer gets the same rate for both mortgages, which is unlikely, since shorter loans typically have lower rates. So rates on 50-year loans could be higher than on 30-year ones.
A lower monthly payment could be beneficial for new buyers looking to get a foothold in the market. But it might also work against them if they are only planning on living in the house for a few years, or if they don’t know how their needs will shake out across decades.
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What about potential drawbacks?
Buyers’ monthly payments may be lower, but they’ll end up paying much more interest over two more decades. With a 50-year loan, total interest on that $400,000 home would amount to $816,396, compared with $438,156 on a 30-year loan. That’s 86 percent more interest over the life of the loans, said Joel Berner, senior economist at Realtor.com.
And it will take much longer for owners to build equity. Ten years into paying off a 30-year mortgage on that $400,000 home, an owner would have a 24 percent stake in a house, setting aside rising home values. With a 50-year mortgage, that would be 14 percent.
Berner said addressing the nation’s affordability problems will take lots of ideas, including how to generate more construction so there are enough homes to meet Americans’ needs. But a new mortgage offering could juice demand before supply can catch up – which would push prices even higher.
“This is a creative way to solve this problem,” Berner said, “but I don’t think it addresses the fundamental issues that we have.”
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What would it take to offer a 50-year mortgage?
Establishing a new kind of mortgage could be possible, albeit complex, wrote Jaret Seiberg, managing director at TD Cowen, in a Monday analyst note. The Dodd-Frank Act – the landmark legislation that reformed the financial system after the 2008 financial crisis – says mortgages that exceed 30 years do not meet the definition of a qualified mortgage, which also means Fannie and Freddie can’t buy them.
But regulators have the ability to alter those qualifications to keep mortgages affordable. All told, the process could take at least a year to implement, Seiberg wrote, and it’s unlikely that lenders would originate 50-year mortgages without clear policy changes first.
Without changing the qualifications, the new loans could be hard to find – and more expensive. Lenders may be less willing to offer 50-year mortgages if they know Fannie and Freddie can’t buy them, a spokesperson for the Mortgage Bankers Association said in a statement. Limited interest from investors could also push interest rates up.
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What’s next?
Any details from the White House or FHFA would be needed for the market to prepare for such a change. Joe Brusuelas, chief economist at RSM, said that for now, the administration’s posts appear to be more about messaging than substantial policy. But, Brusuelas said, younger generations “may look at this differently.”
“If they think they’re saving $300 or $400 a month, then that’s a big deal,” he said. “That covers the car payment, maybe.”
Home under construction in a new neighborhood in Washington Township. (Stephen Frye / MediaNews Group)
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