Wednesday, February 14, 2007

BubbleSphere Roundup

News of the housing market's continuing decline keeps rolling in. I have been slacking off recently when it comes to blogging. :-( Thankfully, we have many excellent blogs to help track and make sense of all this information. Check the links on the sidebar.

Paper Money reports on January's New Construction Report. Paper Money eloquently writes "Reported as showing the slowest pace of housing starts in more than nine years, yesterday’s “New Residential Construction” report seemed to have shaken Wall Streets confidence that the housing decline is in the process of stabilizing. That is, until bullish optimists ran with the notion that this report signaled a good sign for housing as it indicated that home builders were working through inventories and reducing production."

Calculated Risk
continues to do an outstanding job reporting about the economy. In a post titled Subprime: The impact on Existing Home Sales in 2007, Mr. Calculated Risk asks "What will be the impact of tighter lending standards in the subprime mortgage market on existing home sales?"

David Lereah's primary residence and Alexandria condo both drop in value.

Locally, DC Housing Bubble Blues, Southern Maryland Housing Bubble News, Baltimore Metro Area Housing Blog continue to report about the housing bubble in the Washington - Baltimore Metro area. Frankly Realty has joined the blogging effort anbd is based in the Commonwealth of Virginia. One of his posts warns buyers about Exclusive Buyer Agency Contracts. Don't Sign Them... Yet."

13 comments:

  1. David,

    I just posted a fun blog on Realtor Egos Run Amok. Enjoy....

    I'd like to get on your blogroll and vice versa. My site gets about 200 unique visitors a day w/ 400+hits. Now I'm aggressively going to work on the blog section. You'll see from some posts I do care about protecting clients' $$$$.

    jay

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  2. Other important news, OC down $42,00 in one month. From $642,000 to $600,000 - the bubble is bursting in the OC.

    Dr. Housing Bubble

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  3. Jay said:
    "You'll see from some posts I do care about protecting clients' $$$$."

    David,

    What clients' dollars is he talking about? Are these bubble blogs "for profit"?

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  4. The amazing thing for me is that we have had so much decline already, and yet...

    1) interest rates are still very low

    2) there are still lots of jobs

    We are 8 years overdue for a serious recession, and have been running unsustainable trade deficits for at least that long.

    When interest rates really rise, and jobs start disappearing, then the housing market could really take it on the chin.

    A Redskins fan

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  5. DC Area MLS Cracks Down Hard On the Perps Behind Days On the Market Manipulation


    http://smhbn.blogspot.com/2007/02/dc-area-mls-cracks-down-hard-on-perps.html

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  6. Lance-

    The California market is already crashing very hard. I know, I live in Southern CA. DC will play catch-up very soon. Get real with your post. I'm reminded of the family pariot repeating the same thing, when I hear your cheerleading.

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  7. Someone posted this rent vs own calculator on Ben's blog. It's pretty interesting.

    Of course Lance will argue against the assumption that housing prices will return to historical norms. Nevertheless, this gives you a little idea about the risk you are taking when investing in the current housing market.

    http://www.cepr.net/calculators/hb/hcc.html

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  8. Lance,

    Follow the guy's link. He's a Realtor, and doesn't exactly jhide the fact. He's talking about _his_ clients.

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  9. But where is the GLOOM?

    --Non Anon

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  10. http://www.cepr.net/calculators/hb/hcc.html

    Nice link.

    A home doesn't even cash flow at 5 years... that's... odd. I wonder at his rent assumptions (rent is dropping around here). :)

    Me and my fiancee have agreed to a nice strategy. We're going to live as if we just bought a home we liked (not loved, we cannot afford one of those... yet). The difference per month? $2,860 after all taxes, insurance, etc. (savings and costs).

    So if in a year we decide to buy, we'll be ahead quite a bit.

    If its not sustainable... we can take a break for a month, laugh that we overshot, and see what we really can afford. :)

    Now... don't think I'm buying spring 2008. Fall 2008 at the earliest. But this "drill" is her idea, so why not. :)

    We're targeting a home $100k more expensive than I think we can afford. If we can pull it off... we go up market. If not... down market. Rather than finding out after we commited to a payment.

    Now how many people did this who bought in 2005/2006? Yep...

    Got popcorn?
    Neil

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  11. Neil - "got popcorn" is not remotely funny.

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  12. "When interest rates really rise, and jobs start disappearing, then the housing market could really take it on the chin.

    A Redskins fan"

    Yeah, any time now. Any, time, now ...

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  13. Anon 7:14, thanks, yes that makes sense. But it did cause me to look at the ads on David's blog (as I'd never paid them much attention before) ... And I must say I was more than a little surprised to see ads for condos and other REIC products ... Has David "sold out" in order to cover the costs of the blog? Is the blog now part of the great secretive REIC? :)

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