Housing Secretary Shaun Donovan today declared that the housing market had finally “turned a corner” amid reports that foreclosures are down, home sales are up and it’s getting easier for buyers to obtain credit and mortgage money. Even so, new Census data suggest the American dream of buying a home remains elusive.
Four Years Later, Housing Finally Turns a Corner
By mili Follow Tue, 1 May 2012, 12:03pm 5,288 views 60 comments
Watch (0) Share
Quote
Permalink Like Dislike « First « Previous Viewing Comments 21-60 of 60 Last » See most liked comments
|
mili is moderator of this thread. |
Follow
Befriend (4)
52 threads
4,416 comments
Corning, NY
Premium
You could be right.
Follow
Befriend (1)
22 threads
469 comments
San Jose, CA
iwog says
I don’t know where from you got this picture. I returned from Europe a month ago. Spent some time in London, Frankfurt, and Warsaw. Talked and saw real estate in many occasions. When you compare APPLE-TO-APPLE prices in $/SqFt are pretty much same like in US.
Homeownership is smaller than in US, but most owners do not carry mortgage.
Follow
Befriend (3)
28 threads
747 comments
Tarzana, CA
This is how I feel and post many times. All the housing news is just 'crap'
http://www.forexlive.com/blog/2012/05/03/evil-bank-regulator-says-evil-banks-did-not-cause-housing-crisis/
Follow
Befriend
28 threads
351 comments
KILLERJANE says
or you could settle down.. form roots and contribute to your community.. rather than living eternally as a nomad.
Follow
Befriend (48)
274 threads
12,545 comments
47 male
Lafayette, CA
Premium
REpro says
Well lets start with the above map. Are you disputing that $ per sq. ft. in San Francisco is a small fraction of what it costs in Paris? London? Singapore? You say prices are pretty much the same as in the United States but you don't offer a source so how did you come to this conclusion?
What you observed while abroad is certainly not a valid statistical sample.
Follow
Befriend (4)
52 threads
4,416 comments
Corning, NY
Premium
Wow look at that map. Housing overseas is even more outrageous than it is in NYC and SF.
From now on, when I say, "God Bless America", I'm not being sarcastic!
Follow
Befriend (28)
171 threads
4,197 comments
Premium
Of course, there is no reason at all that a 3/2 in Stockton should not cost exactly the same as a 3/2 in Notre Dame, Paris and therefore anyone who is not shoving every dime they have at Realtors® and flipping every property they can get a mortgage broker to write a note for is living in denial and hates prosperity.
Follow
Befriend
2,826 comments
Monterey, CA
REpro says
Well, that's simply untrue for London. Home ownership levels are very similar to the US in the UK and people buy homes using mortgages.
Follow
Befriend (1)
22 threads
469 comments
San Jose, CA
Bigsby says
APPLE-TO-APPLE. Compare Townhouse in London or Paris to similar neighborhood in Manhattan. The difference won’t be that shocking.
iwog says
So what is your reliable source?
Follow
Befriend (7)
37 threads
1,535 comments
Mountain View, CA
bmwman91's website
Premium
BoomAndBustCycle says
LOLWUT
Yes, all house owners are saints that volunteer and actively work to improve their community.
Follow
Befriend
10 threads
419 comments
Only a fool will believe that Egypt, Iran and India cost more than SF.
Follow
Befriend (5)
10 threads
2,329 comments
bmwman91 says
Sounds like coming out of a Realtor. :)
Follow
Befriend
2,826 comments
Monterey, CA
REpro says
Apple-to-apple? Or APPLE-TO-APPLE? Either way London is more expensive. You're probably looking at figures for Greater London, but that is unreasonable given the size of the place - it would make more sense to compare the central part of London with San Francisco.
Follow
Befriend (1)
22 threads
469 comments
San Jose, CA
San Francisco is fine. Look at same quality of buildings with similar location values. Best way is to access local listing in each country. London may be a bit higher, but what iwog showed on picture poster is simply insane.
Follow
Befriend
16 threads
4,426 comments
wthrfrk80 says
Yep.. its called a Global Housing bubble...
Only two nations, Japan and Germany didnt see prices skyrocket... but they both actually saw RE bubble back in the 80s and 90s. So they learned the hard way NOT to inflate RE prices.
Follow
Befriend
16 threads
4,426 comments
iwog says
The burbs of SF as you call it .. i guess you mean Santa Clara County.. has a deflationary economy! as such very little wealth is driven by fundementals. Higher prices in SC only move jobs out as we have seen from MFG to R&D...
Follow
Befriend
16 threads
4,426 comments
iwog says
Dont look now, but the flyover states are full of rich natural gas deposits.. you do realize many farmers/landowners are being paid several hundred thousand for renting their land to the natural gas companies...not even the so called FABLED Facebook millionaires come even close to these numbers.
Its called the next big thing!
http://www.netl.doe.gov/technologies/oil-gas/futuresupply/coalbedng/coalbed_ng.html
Gas boom mints instant millionaires
http://money.cnn.com/2010/10/06/news/economy/penn_community/index.htm
Sutton recently leased his 154 acres of land on the Marcellus Shale to Talisman Energy for a $900,000 up front check, plus a 20% cut of the revenue of the natural gas extracted from his land.
Follow
Befriend (1)
22 threads
469 comments
San Jose, CA
thomas.wong1986 says
Spain will learn own lessen very soon. With about 50% workers out of work, foreclosure is “everyday bread”
Follow
Befriend
16 threads
4,426 comments
hanera says
First off, the Good Schools, which I went to, have been around for a very very long time, long long before bubbles, when we had normal prices...
Second, great jobs/industries, have been around even in the 70s and 80s when we had a strong driver of tech growth...
We really should have had a huge bubble from what you mentioned back in the 80s.. but look again.. IT DIDNT HAPPEN!
Today.. we have far far less jobs, companies, and market strenth. We dont have MFG, and most of OUR employees are actually out of state.. we employ fewer in Bay Area...
Vanishing Public Companies Lead To The Incredible Shrinking Silicon Valley
http://www.siliconbeat.com/2010/02/17/vanishing-public-companies-lead-to-the-incredible-shrinking-silicon-valley/
Follow
Befriend
16 threads
4,426 comments
REpro says
Yep! and so will Ireland, Italy and many others...
Follow
Befriend
16 threads
4,426 comments
FortWayne says
website is dead... gone ... but you can acess from the time machine...
http://web.archive.org/web/20110723181938/http://www.housingbubblebust.com/index.html
The graph is busted.. but the numbers below is updated to 12/2010 ...
If your interested in this data.. copy chart and data points below chart into excel and redo in excel charts...
Follow
Befriend
16 threads
4,426 comments
Indiana...
http://web.archive.org/web/20110722134202/http://www.housingbubblebust.com/OFHEO/States/IN-KY.html
Follow
Befriend (7)
37 threads
1,535 comments
Mountain View, CA
bmwman91's website
Premium
hanera says
Inflation in the SV may well be higher than in other places. On a chart, with percentage on the Y-axis, it would register as a constant offset. When the lines showing pricing in different parts of the BA start diverging on a percentage scale, it indicates that either a) there is new-found wealth in an area that can support rapidly increasing prices, while areas 10 miles away don't get the effect, or b) some part of the system has shifted that is causing an appreciable rise in prices without the fundamentals (income) changing. As we all know now, it was option B with loose credit.
The plateau that SF & SJ have hit, while other areas have been correcting a bit more, does not seem sustainable. None of the fundamentals (incomes) in these areas changed drastically with respect to one another between 2007 & now to support this forever. Various forms of government intervention, some of which at the behest of large private interests involved in RE, have helped this to keep up. How long will it last? I don't know. It's been long enough as far as I am concerned, but it might be a while longer.
I think that some people look at that plot & think, "wow, those areas are super special, what a safe place to put my money!" It's the classic consumer mentality of, "it's expensive, it must be good." At some point, assuming the government stops giving $726k out to anyone that can scrounge together $26,330 and some sort of action takes place with all the underwater / delinquent people in the area, I think that prices will resume their slide off of the plateau. Hmmm...giving that some thought, I think that the price plateau is going to remain exactly where it is at until inflation intersects it. Don't hold your breath!
Follow
Befriend
16 threads
4,426 comments
When you have higher inflation.. you move jobs out...
its no wonder that recently Dell has acquired more of SV companies, since they have more cash on hand to buy other companies and to survive the downturns... thats why we lost mfg back in the 80s and now R&D... If anything we suffer from deflation..as products do more, even during declining market prices.
ON THE RECORD CARL GUARDINO Sunday, May 13, 2007
Q: So are those really challenges?
A: Unequivocally, yes. Not only to the CEOs in the boardroom, but to any family you talk to in their living room.
What we hear time after time from CEOs as well as frontline employees is how incredibly difficult it is to come here and stay here.
That truly does have an impact on a company's bottom line when the cost differential is so much higher here than it is in other regions around the state, nation and globe, or the ability to recruit top talent is also impacted.
You mentioned housing. It probably is the top concern we hear about in Silicon Valley from both CEOs and employees in terms of local issues. Does that have an impact? Let me put a finer point on it.
Hewlett-Packard and Dell are the top two computer-makers in the world. Corporate headquarters for HP are located in Palo Alto and Dell is in Round Rock, Texas. Obviously, they both have people and facilities around the globe.
In those two communities where their corporate headquarters are and where a lot of research and development takes place, the median resale price for a home in Palo Alto is about $1.6 million. In Round Rock, Texas, it's about $180,000, except the home and property are bigger.
We hear from HP all the time that a huge deterrent to the ability to recruit and retain people anywhere near Silicon Valley is the housing issue. We don't hear that from Dell, which is also a member company, about their operations in Round Rock. It does continue to plague us and we will continue to sound the alarm.
Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/05/13/BUG91PO3US1.DTL&ao=all#ixzz1uGIwcJj6
Follow
Befriend (4)
52 threads
4,416 comments
Corning, NY
Premium
thomas.wong1986 says
Exactly.
That's what I can't understand. How can Bay Area companies even survive in a competitive landscape? Sure, top talent likes nice weather, but it really doesn't matter if companies can't afford to pay them enough to live there.
Follow
Befriend (48)
274 threads
12,545 comments
47 male
Lafayette, CA
Premium
thomas.wong1986 says
So tell us what caused the bubble and crash in the United States again? I seem to recall something about conditions that can't be applied to other nations yet you seem to think the whole world is one giant bubble.
Very odd.
Follow
Befriend (4)
52 threads
4,416 comments
Corning, NY
Premium
Wong,
Could you resize that chart? It's WAY too big for the page! Just go into "edit" and change the size numbers in the "upload image" text. Make sure to keep the aspect ratio if you don't want to distort the image.
Follow
Befriend (48)
274 threads
12,545 comments
47 male
Lafayette, CA
Premium
thomas.wong1986 says
It figures you'd link a graph ending in 2008. Hmmmm.......I wonder what has happened to international home prices after that? (I left out Ireland which crashed like the USA due to idiotic conservative policies) It doesn't look like the rest of the world crashed like the USA. Funny for a "bubble" to reach a plateau like that.......
Follow
Befriend
10 threads
419 comments
^
||
That chart.
In some US areas (such as CA and AZ), the bubble is just as big as UK and Spain.
Some US areas never had a bubble. They bring the average down.
Follow
Befriend
1 threads
34 comments
REpro says
Check your data.. only %20! ;-)
Follow
Befriend
1 threads
34 comments
iwog says
Iwog
Where the heck is this data comming from?
Downtown Madrid: "Centro-Sol" is 4331 euros/m^2 (~ $500 / sqft)
http://www.fotocasa.es/indice-inmobiliario__fotocasa.aspx?OrigenVisita=170&link=13336&redirected=true
Checkout how the prices in Spain are going down free-fall
Follow
Befriend (13)
102 threads
3,763 comments
mili says
Onto the Skid Row.
Follow
Befriend (28)
171 threads
4,197 comments
Premium
ja says
The Spanish Realtor®s are insisting that, even if the data is even partially right, it's never been a better time to buy and have comps based on their flips sold to a straw buyer, showing a 150% price increase in used houses over the last three months in Espana.
Follow
Befriend
1 threads
34 comments
APOCALYPSEFUCK is Tony Manero says
Spanish real state market is more conservative that in the US. You don't have the aggressive realtor figure. It's more franchise based. You typically walk through the streets and you see the small offices with a bunch of advertisements of houses and prices.
But they are not selling much. A friend working on one, told me they have sold one house in a hole year. They are making most of their money from managing rentals. Since the market is not very liquid, prices will have to go down slower...
BTW, It looks that finally the government is trying to push banks to mark to value prices:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2012/05/10/bloomberg_articlesM3RUAL6K50XV01-M3SQW.DTL
Follow
Befriend (48)
274 threads
12,545 comments
47 male
Lafayette, CA
Premium
ja says
Spain is one of the places where the real estate market is declining. The data on my graphic is from 2009 and 2010.
The real question is why some of the best American real estate selling for less than a broke, borderline 3rd world country like Spain. American real estate is undervalued.
Follow
Befriend (4)
52 threads
4,416 comments
Corning, NY
Premium
iwog says
Population density maybe? Land development restrictions?
Follow
Befriend
1 threads
34 comments
iwog says
about 30%.. not the ~65% your $1395/sqft in Madrid seems to indicate. I don't trust that graph. It's difficult go get good data, but these one seems completely bios
Because the bubble in Spain was higher. And, unlike America, fueled exclusively basically by low interest rates.
Spain has ~60% GDP per capita than USA, %85 than in France. What is your definition of 3rd world country?
Follow
Befriend (3)
803 comments
Dosen't matter if American real estate is overvalued or undervalued. Deal is unless its a transfer. People tend to remain in their houses through ups and downs never selling albiet for deterioration and maybe they don't like the neighbors anymore. See everyone lost. So you can sit in your pile of stix just congradulating yourself on value maybe get one of those really big equity revolvers. So price goes up they sit down and fart. Price goes down they sit down and fart because now really ain't the time to take a chance on anything. They know this stuff. So you can sit there like maven in your pile of wood thats worth so much shaking your own hand. Which most everyone did. So what? Look. If I have fucking tomato plant with 4 growing seasons. What does that do? Put a price on it you can't. If I have fruit trees. Grape vines. Corn which grows just about anywhere in this place. See there is no "monetary" value on that. None. Your never going to see anything like that in the debt merchant news its foundational to them. They deal in food and shelter thats their base. Always has been.
Follow
Befriend
1 threads
54 comments
all this talk of japan re prices falling, but have any of you actually have ground-level experience with japanese housing market? tried to buy or rent anything south of tokyo?
yes, prices are falling... but still very very expensive. A Ferrari is still expensive half-off.
Follow
Befriend
2,826 comments
Monterey, CA
rockyroad says
Well, I used to live there quite a while ago. What people often fail to mention is that inflation has basically been zero in Japan for a long time. I last went just over a year ago. The prices seemed little different to what they were in the mid-90s. Actually, I've just checked - the CPI was actually lower in 2010 than it was in 1993.