THE BYTE

Welcome to the BYTE, where we serve up the latest home and tech news from the last week for you to sink your teeth into.

This week we’re taking a BYTE out of the summer cool down, retail not going down without a fight, cashing in the coins, your cities safety, and an unlikely partnership. Dig in!

Generally

Slowing Down
Fall has begun and the summer rush is slowing down, at least that’s what the numbers are looking like with homebuilder sentiment down. We also have new numbers that show exactly how long student loans keep people out of the home buying market.

Was This A Surprise?
Kind of, homebuilder sentiment was expected to stay the same at 67 but has dipped down to 64. Sentiment was at an all-time high in May, and with a good summer in sales in the books a dip wasn’t exactly what people thought they would see. When you break down those numbers it’s really the Midwest that had the big drop of -6 and the South of -4, bringing down the average sentiment.

We have all heard of student loans possibly holding millennials back from buying homes, but now we know exactly how long it actually does affect them. NAR published a new study showing that the burden of student loans push people back 7 years and keeps those, which have been able to get a home, away from upgrading by three extra years. With the average millennial carrying about $41,200 in debt but only making around $38,800 a year, they aren’t able to pocket and save as much as they would like.

Knock Knock

Walmart’s Home
Almost all big box stores have been struggling to figure out this whole e-commerce thing and trying to get a leg up on Amazon. Well now Walmart is taking the fight to Amazon. Walmart announced a delivery service that brings your groceries straight into your fridge. Walmart is teaming up with a smart lock/security company that will produce a unique one time code for the delivery person to use so they can get into your house drop off your groceries in the fridge and be on their way. If you’re worried about security, don’t worry you can spy on your delivery person with your smart home camera. The program is piloting in Silicon Valley now.

Take Notes

Will That Be Cash or Coin?
Texas has officially entered an elite club as the second state to have a home purchased with bitcoins. The home, located in the state’s capital of Austin, sold for an undisclosed amount but is in the luxury market. With sales like this expanding out of the always experimenting California it could be a sign of this catching on and with bitcoin forever changing in value it could make things quite interesting. For those curious, when posted 1 bitcoin equaled $3,913.89.

Safe And Sound?
You may have heard of all of the hurricanes, earthquakes, and fires happening everywhere and wondered if your city was safe. A new report rating the safest and riskiest places will help you answer just that. Oklahoma City was the riskiest city because of tornadoes and earthquakes followed by San Jose, LA, Bakersfield, and then Seattle. Safest places were Philadelphia, Phoenix, Buffalo, Orlando, and Brooklyn.

The Next Step
In an unlikely partnership, that actually kind of makes sense once you see the product, Levi’s and Google have partnered up to make the latest wearable. A jean jacket or as they call it, Commuter Trucker Jacket with Jacquard by Google. Jokes aside the coat is perfect for anyone biking or that needs to control their phone but can’t pull it out. Basically it connects to your phone and is controlled with programmable motions on your sleeve and for the most part the coat is not noticeable as a piece of smart tech.

Totally Unrelated

Fun Fact For The Day
Sure there are countless movies on people drilling into the core of the planet or digging a hole to the other side, but now you can impress everyone by knowing exactly how far down we’ve actually gone into our world with this video.