Homeowners are acquiring record amounts of home equity, thanks to fast-rising values in the housing market. People are starting to tap into that cash, mainly to make their homes even more valuable.
Spending on home renovations topped $152 billion in 2017, and is expected to increase almost 5% this year. According to the National Association of Home Builders, projects included regular updates and repairs, as well as large remodeling requests.
Homeowners are using that cash for education expenses and paying down other debt. Additionally, owners are borrowing against their homes and putting cash into other investments such as as stocks and additional real estate.
Wall Street is shaky Thursday as investors consider both the upsides and downsides of the latest signals that the U.S. economy remains in much better shape than feared.
Threatened by possible shortages of lithium for electric car batteries, automakers are racing to lock in supplies of the once-obscure “white gold” in a politically and environmentally fraught competition from China to Nevada to Chile.
The number of different electronic cigarette devices sold in the U.S. has nearly tripled to over 9,000 since 2020, driven almost entirely by a wave of unauthorized disposable vapes from China, according to tightly controlled sales data obtained by The Associated Press.
