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Strategies & Market Trends : The Residential Real Estate Crash Index -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: koan who wrote (265529)	8/1/2010 12:44:28 PM
From: Valuepro	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 306849

"People need a place to live. Our housing market is tight as a tick and about to explode way past old highs. This is due to people moving here looking for work and higher construction costs." Whoa, there, buddy! Construction costs have only a small part to play in housing costs. As you well know, value is in location. That is derived from land. It is land value and not the cost of the materials upon it that determines the larger part of value. You can't have rising real estate prices when land values are falling, even if your get your way in allowing some struggling home owners to refinance to 120 percent of questionable appraised values. Your scheme will not do any more than, perhaps, modestly slow the trend in falling land values in the broad market. Maybe your local market is an exception, but it is not what is happening nationally. VP in AZ

To: koan who wrote (265529)	8/1/2010 1:29:06 PM
From: ggersh	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 306849

Even if what you said applies in general, without the proper jobs you can't get a jump in prices. and down in the 48 there aren't many jobs. And the shadow inventory is out there, looming. I truly hope your scenario works out, but I have my doubts.

To: koan who wrote (265529)	8/1/2010 1:33:02 PM
From: Giordano Bruno	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 306849

>Our housing market is tight as a tick and about to explode way past old highs.< Agreed, the housing market is about to explode along with FDIC. 14.7 Million (19%) Of US Mortgages Have $770 Billion In Underwater Equity, $2.4 Trillion In Total Debt Impaired zerohedge.com

To: koan who wrote (265529)	8/1/2010 2:48:18 PM
From: pstuartb	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 306849

a house in Portland, Oregon and it took two years to find There are plenty of houses available in Portland. I've lived in my neighborhood for 16 years and I rarely saw a for sale sign for the first 14 years. In the last year or two, for sale signs have been springing up all over the place. I'm reasonably certain it's because people are underwater on mortgages they can't afford anymore. I also see houses on the market for quite a while, like a year or more, and it's common now to see sellers drop their prices several times before they finally sell. Portland also has a glut of condo space from overbuilding in the last 6-7 years. A number of major condo high-rises in the downtown area have had to convert to apartment status because they can't sell the condos. And the buildings have significant vacancies. Property prices in Portland are protected to some degree by the Urban Growth Boundary, which limits sprawl by making it difficult to build outside the boundary. The Portland area didn't have the huge run up in prices like the places that are in disaster mode now, and it's probably one of the better markets on the west coast. Even so, prices have dropped by about 20% across the board in the last two and a half years in the Portland metro area. The Mount Tabor neighborhood has always been in relatively high demand. The lots are fairly small there, with most of the houses having been built around 1900-1920. It's a fashionable, gentrified neighborhood and someone focusing on an area like that might have to look for a while. But supply there doesn't translate to the rest of the Portland area very well. $350k will currently get you a 2800-3000sqft house built in the last 10 years in the Portland suburbs, and you wouldn't have to look long. Congrats to your kids, sounds like they got a nice place.