A recent report highlights that the Midwest and South lead the nation in homebuyer affordability and new home construction. These regions are setting the pace, according to a comprehensive analysis by Realtor.com.

The 2026 edition of Realtor.com’s housing report cards assessed all 50 states, along with the District of Columbia, revealing that the Midwest and South outshine the Northeast and West in these key areas.

Although no state achieved a perfect A+ rating, 12 out of the 13 top-performing states were in the Midwest and South, earning grades from B- to A. The report bases half of its evaluation on housing affordability, with the other half focused on the level of homebuilding activity.

“This year’s update underscores persistent regional differences but also uncovers significant changes, including a new leader and several states that experienced notable shifts in their scores,” remarked Joel Berner, a senior economist at Realtor.com.

Indiana emerged as the frontrunner, scoring 76.3 out of 100. The state secured an A grade due to its robust affordability and active homebuilding sector, climbing three positions from the previous year’s rankings.

The median-priced home in the Hoosier State was $295,810 and required about 28% of the median household income of $71,469, which fell below the 30% benchmark for affordability.

Other states to receive A grades include Iowa, which has a median listing price of $282,886 and a median household income of $75,991, as well as last year’s leader South Carolina, with a median listing price of $363,896 and a median income of $67,758.

Texas ranked fourth with an A- grade, given the Lone Star State’s median listing price of $364,749 and median income of $76,585. North Carolina and Nebraska were the only two states to receive B+ grades.

The biggest risers in the report compared with last year were Delaware and Utah, which each jumped 12 spots. Delaware rose from 19th to 7th, while Utah saw its ranking rise from 29th to 17th.

Six states received F grades on their report cards, with New York ranking last due to a $668,173 median listing price and median income of $82,657. The other five states that received F grades were all located in the Northeast or West, with Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Hawaii, California and Connecticut rounding out the bottom of the list in order of the worst grade to the best.

Most of the states near the bottom of the rankings saw their rankings hold steady or change little from a year ago, as they continue to face high prices, limited land for building with restrictive zoning policies, and building costs outpacing what middle-income buyers can afford.

The biggest drops were three states which all fell eight spots in the rankings – Alabama fell from 13th to 21st, Maryland dropped from 23rd to 31st, and New Jersey slipped from 35th to 43rd.

Here’s the list of the Realtor.com report’s grades for each of the 50 states as well as the District of Columbia:

• Alabama: C
• Alaska: C-
• Arizona: C
• Arkansas: B
• California: F
• Colorado: C+
• Connecticut: F
• Delaware: B
• District of Columbia: D+
• Florida: B
• Georgia: B
• Hawaii: F
• Idaho: C
• Illinois: C
• Indiana: A
• Iowa: A
• Kansas: B
• Kentucky: C
• Louisiana: C
• Maine: C-
• Maryland: C
• Massachusetts: F
• Michigan: C
• Minnesota: C+
• Mississippi: C-
• Missouri: C
• Montana: D
• Nebraska: B+
• Nevada: C-
• New Hampshire: D+
• New Jersey: D
• New Mexico: C-
• New York: F
• North Carolina: B+
• North Dakota: C
• Ohio: C+
• Oklahoma: B
• Oregon: D-
• Pennsylvania: C
• Rhode Island: F
• South Carolina: A
• South Dakota: B
• Tennessee: C
• Texas: A-
• Utah: C+
• Vermont: D+
• Virginia: C+
• Washington: C-
• West Virginia: C
• Wisconsin: C
• Wyoming: C-

2022

June 16

At 7:03 p.m., Sarah Davey welcomed her son, Preston Davey, into the world at Wythenshawe Hospital in south Manchester. Born four weeks ahead of schedule, Preston weighed 5 pounds and 7 ounces.

June 21

Just days after his birth, Preston was placed into emergency foster care under an interim care order issued by Oldham Council. Foster parents Sandra and Paul Cooper took him in, providing care for the first nine months of his life.

2023

January 6

Varley and McGowan-Fazakerley are approved by Adoption Now, a company providing services to local councils. The company says Preston needs: ‘Love, affection, safety and stability.’

February 13

They meet Preston for the first time during a ‘bumped into’ meeting with Mr and Mrs Cooper and social workers at a pub in Aston-under-Lyne, Manchester.

March 23

Introductory meetings begin proper, first at Mr and Mrs Cooper’s home, then later at Varley and McGowan-Fazakerley’s house, in Staining Road, Blackpool.

March 31

Preston spends his first night at the men’s home and is formally placed under their care.

April 6

Varley texts his sister, a baby sleep trainer, saying: ‘He’s dead meat today. Didn’t sleep last night after 11.30pm. Up every one and a half hours.’

April 23-25

Varley takes several videos of himself naked in the bath with Preston, some for over an hour, and other pictures of Preston with his genitals exposed. The prosecution said these showed he had a sexual interest in the baby.

May 11

McGowan-Fazakerley abandons a 999 call then calls 111 to report Preston has ‘breathing problems.’ A call back from a doctor goes unanswered.

May 12

Preston is visited at home by a health visitor and appears well.

May 25

At 11.10am Preston is rushed to Blackpool Victoria Hospital, floppy and unresponsive. Varley reports he has had a nosebleed and the infant has a suspected seizure in A&E. 

Nursing staff notice two bruises on his head. A medical report states he has `unexplained injuries, inconsistent with a version of events given.’ 

Hospital safeguarding are informed and social services and Lancashire Police called.

Following discussions with medical staff the bruises are put down to a baby learning to crawl and are not regarded as suspicious. He is discharged two days later.

June 12

Varley takes a photo of Preston naked and sends it to McGowan-Fazakerley with a crude comment about his private parts. 

Another picture shows bruising on the child’s bottom – consistent with a human bite mark.

June 15

The night before Preston’s first birthday. 

Varley is angry and frustrated because McGowan-Fazakerley is delayed home from a work trip. 

At 9.07pm Varley takes a video showing Preston tired and falling asleep while music from the film Moana plays loudly in the background. 

As he nods off Varley wakes him by shouting ‘Boo’. 

He later takes another video of Preston having an apparent seizure, which the prosecution say is the aftermath of a sexual assault.

June 30

At 8.25pm, Varley and McGowan-Fazakerley take Preston to Blackpool Victoria Hospital A&E Department, saying he has a rash, diarrhoea, vomiting and high temperature.

Nurses notice bruising to Preston’s head, but staff are shown a home video of the child pulling a toy box onto himself, by way of explanation. 

Varley comments: ‘You lot are going to think we have been abusing him or something.’ 

It is later discovered the toy box video was filmed 12 days earlier. Preston is discharged the following day.

July 4

Social worker Amy Shepherdson visits and finds Preston is not himself and looks ‘pale’.

She notes: ‘He tried to smile several times but then this changed to a very sad face and a little cry.’

July 6

At 10.36am Varley takes Preston to hospital for third time with an injury to his left arm, which he says Preston sustained as he lay him in his cot the previous evening. 

After X-ray, a cast is applied for a fractured elbow.

The child’s social worker, Amy Shepherdson, who had been in contact with the hospital, texts Varley to say: `Just to reassure you they said they had absolutely no concerns. U absolutely did the right thing.’

July 7

Preston is visited at home by Helen Magee, an independent reviewer from Oldham social services.

In her report of the visit, apparently addressed to the baby, she writes:

‘I did watch your [Preston’s] responses to your daddies quite carefully as I’m aware that you had a few hospital admissions of late and this made me ponder a little bit as to whether there was a problem I could see.

‘I decided there wasn’t.’

The same week Varley tells a work colleague he is struggling mentally and having ‘dark thoughts’ about drowning or suffocating Preston.

July 13

Rebecca Warhurst, headteacher of South Shore Academy, in Blackpool, where Varley worked, pays him a welfare visit because of concerns over his mental state. 

He reassures her he is ok and she leaves with no concerns.

July 23

Four days before Preston’s death, Varley takes seven photos of Preston, stretching over a period of three minutes, 12 seconds. 

The child, asleep or unconscious, has his head and arms over the top horizontal bar of his cot and his neck resting on it, his body partially suspended and his legs in a `frog like’ position. 

His tongue is protruding and his lips appear blue. 

Later, Varley also takes a picture of Preston’s ‘abnormal’ bottom.

July 27

At 4.45pm, Varley records a 35-second video on his phone of Preston in ‘extreme respiratory distress’, gasping and in need of immediate resuscitation.

At 6.30pm Preston is rushed to Blackpool Victoria Hospital in a critical condition and Varley reports he found him submerged in the bath.

A team of paramedics, nurses and doctors attempt to resuscitate for 50 minutes, but Preston is pronounced dead at 7.18pm.

July 31

A Home Office post-mortem examination concludes Preston’s cause of death is due to acute upper airway obstruction and rules out drowning.

It also finds around 40 external and internal injuries including bruises to Preston’s forehead, throat, mouth, bladder, bottom and bleeding in his lungs. 

Some of the injuries are regarded as clinical signs of sexual abuse.

2025

June 11/12

Varley and McGowan-Fazakerley are arrested and charged in connection with Preston’s death.

2026

April 20

Varley and McGowan-Fazakerley go on trial denying all offences.

An unfortunate BASE jumping incident over the weekend claimed the lives of two individuals in a Utah canyon, including a renowned daredevil who famously shared the stage with Madonna during the 2012 Super Bowl, officials have reported.

The Grand County Sheriff’s Office in Utah identified one of the deceased as Andy Lewis, a prominent figure in the world of extreme sports. Lewis was celebrated for his daring exploits in BASE jumping, a high-risk activity where participants leap from towering structures or natural formations, deploying a parachute to reach the ground safely.

According to a social media update by Aerial Arts Moab, an acrobatics company that described Lewis as a “co-owner and best friend,” the tragic accident occurred during a tandem jump, where two individuals are secured together in a single harness.

Lewis also founded BASE Jump Moab, a company offering tandem jumps to those new to the sport, allowing them to experience the thrill while harnessed to an experienced guide equipped with a parachute. The company’s promotional videos showcase duos stepping off massive cliffs, experiencing a brief freefall before their parachutes deploy.

Within the BASE jumping community, Lewis was both admired and respected for his audacious approach, often challenging conventions by attempting jumps through narrow gaps or delaying parachute deployment beyond what others would consider safe. John McEvoy, a fellow BASE jumping instructor from Twin Falls, Idaho, who had jumped with Lewis, noted his reputation for such bold endeavors.

“He had an incredible level of athleticism and skill that was developed over years of practice,” McEvoy said. “But then he would take an incredible amount of risk.”

Grand County Sheriff Jamison Wiggins confirmed the other person who was killed was Danny Joe Kregle, a 68-year-old father and grandfather who was described by a family member as an accomplished businessman.

“Danny had a wonderful sense of humor and was always looking for ways to make people laugh,” relative Sydney Laverty told The Times-Independent. “One of his greatest joys was performing magic tricks alongside his granddaughter.”

Lewis’ other sport made him an overnight celebrity, thanks to Madonna

Lewis was also a prominent figure in the niche sports of slacklining and tricklining, which combine elements of high-wire walking with aerial acrobatics — sometimes at perilous heights.

He went from obscure athlete to overnight celebrity when he appeared onstage in Madonna’s 2012 Super Bowl halftime show. Dressed in a Roman toga, Lewis bounced and executed tricks on his inch-wide line like it was a trampoline while Madonna sang behind him.

“My phone actually rang itself to death three days in a row,” Lewis said soon afterward in an appearance on Conan O’Brien’s late night show.

Emergency responders were dispatched Sunday to a report of people injured in a BASE jumping attempt at Mineral Bottom, a remote desert area near the Utah-Colorado line, according to the sheriff’s office.

BASE jumping is far more dangerous than skydiving

Though there’s no official tally of BASE jumping deaths, a list compiled by the website BASEaddict.com shows 540 total fatalities worldwide since 1981 — including 30 people killed last year. Prominent deaths include BASE jumper Dean Potter and his climbing partner, Graham Hunt, who were killed in 2015 while attempting a wingsuit flight in California’s Yosemite National Park.

A study focused on BASE jumping in Norway, published in a medical journal in 2007, estimated that BASE jumping carried risks of injury or death five to eight times greater than skydiving.

Lewis openly acknowledged the sport’s inherent danger.

“It’s weird to think about how many people are dead, because it’s like a normal thing,” Lewis told documentary filmmaker Ella Warnick in an interview published last year.

Tandem BASE jumping carries additional risk because it straps together two people, one of whom generally lacks experience, under a single parachute, McEvoy said. But because they involve novices, they also tend to be the most low-risk, basic types of jumps.

“Within BASE, it’s a very controversial topic,” McEvoy said. “There’s a lot of people who say it’s the stupidest thing in the world and others arguing: `No, we’re giving people the experience of their lives.’”

No one immediately returned phone, text and Facebook messages left Monday for BASE Jump Moab.

Lewis won four straight world championships in competitive slacklining from 2008 through 2011. Lewis set a Guinness World Record for slackline surfing, swaying his feet side to side in a rocking motion that mimics surfing, while keeping his balance above China’s Diaoshuilou waterfall in 2011.

In 2014, he walked a slackline suspended between two hot air balloons more than 4,000 feet (1,200 meters) above the Nevada desert.

In a tragic turn of events over the weekend, a shooting near a popular recreational spot in Stuttgart, Arkansas, has left several children injured. The unsettling incident unfolded close to the John Cain Aquatic Center, a place typically filled with laughter and community spirit.

According to the Stuttgart Police Department, officers swiftly responded to the scene on Saturday, just before 5 p.m. local time, following reports of gunfire. The chaos resulted in three children sustaining gunshot wounds, all of whom were immediately transported to a nearby hospital for urgent medical attention.

Among the injured, one child suffered a gunshot wound to the chest. Details on the conditions of the other two young victims have not been disclosed, leaving the community anxiously awaiting updates on their recovery.

Thanks to the prompt response of law enforcement, aided by the Arkansas County Sheriff’s Office, a suspect was apprehended just minutes after the shooting occurred. Authorities have opted not to release any names at this stage, citing the involvement of juveniles in this distressing case.

“At this time, no names will be released, as all parties involved are juveniles,” the department noted.

In a statement on Facebook, the John Cain Aquatic Center said the aquatic center will be closed “until further notice.”

It is unclear what led to the shooting.

Police said the investigation remains active, and officers are continuing to gather information regarding the circumstances surrounding the incident.

Stuttgart police said the shooting left the department “deeply saddened.” 

“Our thoughts and prayers are with the victims, their families, and every person affected by this tragic incident,” the police statement said. “We remain committed to thoroughly investigating this case and ensuring accountability for those responsible.”

The Stuttgart Police Department, Arkansas County Sheriff’s Office, Arkansas State Police and Stuttgart Parks Department did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s requests for comment.

Stuttgart is a small town in eastern Arkansas, about an hour southeast of Little Rock.

Billy Bush has recently criticized his former Today show colleague, Al Roker, describing him as ‘toxic,’ ‘mean,’ and ‘unprepared.’ Bush shared his negative experiences with Roker during his short tenure at the NBC morning show in 2016.

The media personality, 54, appeared on Friday’s edition of The Nerve With Maureen Callahan where he called Roker, 71, ‘territorial, vindictive and chronically unprepared’ at work.

According to Bush, Roker displayed passive-aggressive behavior towards him from their initial collaboration on Access Hollywood.

This tension reportedly persisted when Bush joined the Today show in May 2016. Roker had even posted on social media, welcoming Bush with a tweet that read, ‘A big welcome to @billybush joining our crazy family. Tradition: New guy buys dinner.’

Bush commented, ‘He does this all the time. There’s something about me in particular that was [he] likes me but fears me, didn’t want me anywhere near.’

The Daily Mail has contacted Roker’s representatives for additional comments on the situation.

Billy Bush, 54, painted a nasty picture of former Today show costar Al Roker as ‘toxic,’ ‘mean’ and ‘unprepared’ as he slammed the stalwart weatherman for how he treated him during his brief stint on the NBC morning show 

Roker, 71, was described by his one-time colleague as ‘territorial, vindictive and chronically unprepared.’

Bush said that prior to his sudden October 2016 dismissal on the show – after he was heard on the infamous 2005 tape in which President Donald Trump boasted how his fame enabled him to grab women’s genitals – plans were in the works to jettison Roker by the spring of 2017.

Bush recalled how he and Roker worked together on the third hour of the Today show, which he predicted ‘would never be a successful hour, because [Roker is] maybe the worst interviewer on television.’

He said NBC exec Noah Oppenheim told him that he needed to survive until March of 2017, at which time NBC officials planned to ‘unload’ the ‘toxic’ Roker and ‘get him out of this deal.’

The plans never came to fruition, Bush said, as ‘the Trump thing’ cut short his tenure on the network program.

Bush said Roker irritated him by liking social media posts that were negative about him – in one case, when a social media user described Bush as ‘a whitesplaining racist.’

‘I’m the new guy and this dude’s liking tweets from people that are calling me things that are career-ending and awful and not f***ing true!’ Bush said.

Matt Lauer – who would lose his lead anchor job on the show in 2017 amid sexual misconduct allegations – was not a welcoming presence to Bush on the program either.

Bush said that while his NBC bosses were behind him, it was clear that Lauer and Roker ‘definitely did not want me there.’

Roker welcomed Bush to the Today show with a reminder that the ‘new guy buys dinner’

Al Roker, Billy Bush, actor James Spader and Tamron Hall seen on the September 22, 2016 edition of Today

Bush, appearing on Friday’s edition of The Nerve With Maureen Callahan, said dealing with Roker generally made for an unpleasant experience 

He recalled of the tension, ‘You could feel it … I could feel it in the room with them.’

Bush chalked up to NBC’s tolerance of Roker and his antics to the TV star’s longevity, with more than three decades on the program.

‘People don’t know how mean he is – he’s mean, he’s mean, he’s a mean person.

‘When you say rageful and all that, yeah – there is rage in there. There’s jealousy, and I talk about vindictiveness, but he’s mean. He doesn’t share the air.’

Bush noted how legendary late Tonight Show host Johnny Carson believed that a strong appearance from others on his program reflected well on him and the show itself.

‘Like, we all do well, everybody wins – not Al,’ Bush said. ‘He sees somebody doing well on the Today Show, and immediately it’s, “Take them down.”‘

Asked by Callahan why Roker was so angry when considering his successful career, Bush said that the weatherman’s fury, rage and anger often got the best of him.

‘When I got there, a younger guy with a full head of hair, who the women on the staff genuinely liked a lot – and that was infuriating to him,’ Bush said. 

‘And when I got sacked and sent out of there, all the women were destroyed, and the men, which is Al and Matt … they were, “Get him out of here.”‘

On Monday, officials unveiled fresh insights into a string of arson attacks aimed at properties linked to U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer, suggesting that the perpetrators were orchestrated by a Russian-speaking coordinator.

Authorities have disclosed that the individuals involved were lured with promises of payment to execute a well-planned offensive in London during May 2025. This campaign included targeting a vehicle and two properties associated with Starmer.

According to a recent investigation, the mastermind behind these operations is suspected to be a diplomat with expertise in information warfare, acting as part of a larger Russian sabotage and disinformation strategy managed from Moscow, as reported by the Kyiv Post.

Convictions have been secured for Ukrainian national Roman Lavrynovych, 22, and Romanian national Stanislav Carpiuc, 27, for their roles in the arson scheme. Lavrynovych was reportedly recruited via a Russian-speaking Telegram handler known as “El Money,” based on police and courtroom accounts. The Kyiv Post also noted that Carpiuc has Ukrainian roots. Meanwhile, a third individual, Petro Pochynok, 35, was found not guilty.

The incident underscores the geopolitical tensions that continue to ripple through Europe, highlighting the vulnerabilities even at the highest levels of government.