New York City Housing Bubble - 'The BIG Picture'

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The Crisis Is Contained! Ya, Right.
2008-02-01 02:08:00
Pay no attention to the wisdom of the pros, debt levels, housing market depression, fundamentals, technical charts, inflation, gold, unemployment, the global market, bank write-downs, CDO's, SIV's, CLO's, shadow accounting, hedge fund failures, bond issurer and monoline downgrades, nationalization of the home mortgage market, desperate consumer based stimulus packages, Fannie & Freddie mortgage ceiling increases, interest rate cuts, commodity inflation. All is contained! Continue buying stocks. We're having the shortest recession in 40 years! Ya, right.'It's going to be much worse' by Fortune - snip:Famed investor Jim Rogers sees hard times ahead for the United States - and a big opportunity looming in China. You might expect Jim Rogers to be gloating a little bit. After all, the famed investor has been predicting a recession in the U.S. economy for months and shorting the shares of now-tanking Wall Street investment banks for even longer. And with fears of a recession spar...
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Are You Thinking Survivalist Time?
2008-01-31 03:31:00
Short post tonight folks, busy day.Biggs's Tips for Rich: Expect War, Study Blitz, Mind Marketsby Bloomberg - 1/29 snip:Barton Biggs has some offbeat advice for the rich: Insure yourself against war and disaster by buying a remote farm or ranch and stocking it with "seed, fertilizer, canned food, wine, medicine, clothes, etc." The 'etc.' must mean guns. "A few rounds over the approaching brigands' heads would probably be a compelling persuader that there are easier farms to pillage," he writes in his new book, "Wealth, War and Wisdom."Biggs is no paranoid survivalist. He was chief global strategist at Morgan Stanley before leaving in 2003 to form hedge fund Traxis Partners. He doesn't lock and load until the last page of this smart look at how World War II warped share prices, gutted wealth and remains a warning to investors. His message: Listen to markets, learn from history and prepare for the worst. "Wealth, War and Wisdom" fills a void. Library shelves are packed with volu...
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A Buying Frenzy Morphed Into A Foreclosure Frenzy
2008-01-30 01:27:00
US 10-city home price drop a record in Nov-S&P by Reuters - snip:Home prices in 10 major metropolitan areas fell a record 8.4%percent in the year through November, suggesting the housing slump is worsening, according to a Standard & Poor index released on Tuesday. The decline in the S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Index topped the 6.7% annual drop for October and was deeper than predicted by economists at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. The consensus was for a 7.1% fall, Goldman economists said. Home prices across big cities have now declined for 11 consecutive months and show little sign of bottoming, said economists, including Robert Shiller, a founder of the index and chief economist at MacroMarkets LLC. The decline in the index accelerated to 2.2% in November over October, from 1.4 percent in the previous month, S&P said. It "confirms our outlook that the housing shock is by no means over," said Michelle Meyer, an economist at Lehman Brothe...
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Those Foreign Buyers Of NYC Real Estate: UH, "Let's Wait And See What Happ
2008-01-29 02:53:00
Initial Tremors by NY Magazine - snip:Those overseas buyers who?ve been driving the New York condo market are starting to slam on the brakes. Last Tuesday, Prudential Douglas Elliman?s Alex Chang heard from four overseas clients. All had been looking at New York property, and all were calling with the same message: ?Let?s hold off and see what happens.? Global markets had suffered huge setbacks, fueled by worries over the economy, and city brokers and sellers were bracing themselves for any fallout. Downtown expert Darren Sukenik saw a client from Spain, poised to go into contract for a $5 million condo at a high-end building that?s rising in the West Village, abruptly change course. The day before, Century 21 NY Metro?s Jorden Tepper learned that a Dutch buyer working with his office had nixed a deal even though his offer had already been accepted. ?It?s getting hard to get a commitment,? says his colleague Sherri Shang, who has many Chinese buyers.Brooklyn Neighborhood Leads N.Y....
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Housing Drags Economy Down The Sink
2008-01-26 18:44:00
Forecast update: Housing drags economy down the sink by Merrill Lynch - snips:The recession in housing has spilled over to the rest of the economy, in our view. We now expect an outright contraction in economic activity in the first three quarters of 2008. This downturn should be led by consumer spending... As we saw in prior post-bubble de-leveraging episodes, the healing process takes time as the bad debts get extinguished and balance sheets repaired.... Home prices are expected to decline by 15% in 2008 and by a further 10% in 2009, with more depreciation likely beyond the forecast period. The inventory situation has become intractable and home prices are still far above historical norms when benchmarked against other measures such as rent or GDP. Housing starts will probably slide another 30% from current levels, to 700k by the end of 2008 ? a historic low needed to clear inventories amid the worst housing financial crisis in decades... We anticipate job losses in the ra...
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December 2007 - Biggest Year-Over-Year Home Price Decline On Record
2008-01-25 03:46:00
Homes see first annual price drop on recordby CNN Money - snip:Price s of homes sold in December registered the biggest year-over-year decline on record, according to a report from an industry trade group, and 2007 is the first year on record that has seen a drop. The National Association of Realtors (NAR) said on Thursday that the median price of homes sold in December fell nearly 6% from a year earlier to $208,400. The three biggest declines in prices ever recorded have now come in the last four months. In addition to the December price decline, NAR reported the median price for all homes sold in 2007 fell 1.3% to $218,900, the first time that the annual price reading has shown a decline since the group started tracking that measure in 1968...Soros accuses Fed of panic cutby Financial Times - snip:...In one Davos session almost 60 per cent of the -delegates voted in favour of a motion saying central banks had lost both their focus and control with respect to -economic governance....
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Funny Money Printing Is Not The Solution, It Is The Problem
2008-01-24 02:43:00
Merrill Lynch says US nationwide home prices may fall 30%by Market Watch - snips:Merrill Lynch forecasts nationwide US home prices could decline 25% to 30% over the next three years, as new supply and weak demand weigh on the market. "This sounds dire... but would only reverse part of the unprecedented 130% price surge from 2000 to 2006," wrote economist David Rosenberg in a research note released Wednesday. Rosenberg added the S&P 500 may decline an additional 20% to 25% to breach the 1,100-point level if the market follows historical precedents at times when the U.S. economy is in recession.Fed Risks Fueling More Bubbles, Davos Economists Sayby Bloomberg - snip:The Federal Reserve, which yesterday announced its first emergency rate cut since 2001, is ignoring history's lessons and risks re-igniting more asset bubbles, economists at the World Economic Forum annual meeting said. The Fed is saying "we are there to clean up after bubbles first rather than to prevent the danger," ...
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Plunge Protection Team & Fed Reserve Meet Wizard Of Oz
2008-01-23 02:22:00
The Falling Knife by Jon Taplin - snip:The Dow opening was brutal as predicted. Helicopter Ben is throwing liquidity at the market with an emergency rate cut. The market doesn?t seem to care. While the market is off the lows right now, be careful not to buy into a suckers rally. As my Princeton Classmate, Vince Farrell (CNBC) said in a note this morning: Bob Doll of Blackrock (they manage $1 trillion !!!) was on the show from Italy this morning and made the very good point that whatever low we set, hopefully soon, will be retested before too long. That tends to be the case. Most lows are tested after a brief, usually substantive, rally. We are in the process of deleveraging an overly leveraged economy. The fever has to run its course and bolts from the blue will not stop the inevitable. Remember though, when it?s time to buy, you won?t want to. "Will Fed rate cuts restore confidence in markets? by MarketWatch - snips:An emergency cut in interest rates by the Federal Reserve seemed t...
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Global Markets Plunge On Wall Street Holiday
2008-01-21 20:54:00
   Futures above at 12:30pm ESTUS stock futures point to major decline on re-openby MarketWatch - snip:If futures contracts traded on a day when U.S. stocks weren't even due to open are anything near accurate, then markets will be in for a major decline on Tuesday, with concerns about bond insurers and the health of financial institutions dragging markets lower...US May Be Heading for Severe Recession by Bloomberg - snips:The U.S. may be headed for a recession worse than any seen in the past 25 years, as households are weighed down by a housing slump, debt and high fuel and food prices, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing economists including Merrill Lynch & Co.'s David Rosenberg... University of Maryland economist Carmen Reinhart and Harvard University economist Kenneth Rogoff said the recession may end up at least as bad as the five worst to hit industrialized countries since World War II... Recovery can't start while financial institutions are still uns...
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Systemic Risk - Bond Insurers' Nightmare Scenario A Cometh
2008-01-20 15:42:00
LaRouche International Video-Webcast 1/17/08Link to Video: Surviving The Greatest Financial Crash EverMarketTicker Forum - The Monoline Question, Bond Insurers Q&A TheStreet.com - Coming Week: Upside Down - snip: Recession is no longer the taboo word on Wall Street. It's being tossed around like confetti.The new phrase that can't be uttered is "systemic risk," and with bond insurer Ambac losing its triple-A credit rating from Fitch Ratings on Friday, the real risk of a financial disaster will be widely whispered into the next week amid the possibility of more downgrades for the industry.T.J. Marta, fixed income strategist with RBC Capital Markets, estimates that roughly $2.5 trillion in outstanding debt is backed by bond insurers like Ambac and MBIA, and credit downgrades are a mortal threat to their business models.If the bond insurers fail, that raises the specter of a massive wave of wealth destruction in a global financial system that is flooded with illiquid and opaque deriva...
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HEADS UP - THE PANIC HAS BEGUN
2008-01-19 17:47:00
Cramer on Financials, Rages on Banks by CNBC - Video & Article Snips:...Why isn't the Securities and Exchange Commission getting more involved in the whole banking sector writedown situation? Especially since the numbers are likely to get worse, not better? That's what Jim Cramer, CNBC's resident stock guru, wants to know. "It's all fiction!" he declared during a forceful exchange (see it in full in the accompanying video) on CNBC's "Squawk Box." "How can we have these levels of fiction in financials after Sarbanes-Oxley? How do people get away with this? How do they live with themselves?" Cramer made his comments while reviewing results from Merrill. But his real consternation surrounded the insurers who cover banking investments. Some of those insurers haven't come clean about their liabilities, Cramer speculated. Eventually they will, and then the "fiction" will disappear, he said. The banking sector and its related industries are all too chummy, Cramer accused. That le...
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Stimulus Package Is NO Solution - 2000pt Market Drop On Tap?
2008-01-19 17:34:00
 w/Jim Cramer - He Turns BearishNotes Consequence of Bond Insurers CollapseAlso See My Post From Yesterday on Bond Insurershttp://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134 540/vp/22734052#22734052 ------WSJ - We're All Keynesians NowNYT - Bond Insurers? Distress Rattles Wall St Economist Magazine - Bond insurers, All fall down? Reconcilling with RealityFinancially, where do you hide?http://link.brightcove.com/services/ link/bcpid203719194/bclid86272812/bctid13 81697103 ------Financial Sense University - AUDIO: Weekly NewshourFSU - James Turk: $53 Trillion And GrowingPrudent Bear - Doug Noland: Credit Bubble Bulletin, Daisy ChainBloomberg - UBS to Close US Finance Unit, How Many Layoffs?Jim Sinclair - The End Of A Powerfull Week In FinanceMarket Ticker - Folding FridayNYT - Gold?s Rise: It?s Not Just Armageddon Investors Digest - Gold beyond $1000?New York City Housing Bubble - The BIG Picture
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As The Bond Insurers Collapse, Wall Street Debt Junkies Will Follow
2008-01-19 01:34:00
Ambac Insurance Loses AAA Ranking at Fitch Ratingsby Bloomberg - snip:Ambac Financial Group Inc. became the first bond insurer to lose its AAA rating after Fitch Ratings downgraded the company. Ambac Assurance Corp. was lowered two levels to AA and may be reduced further, New York-based Fitch said today in a statement. The downgrade "reflects the significant uncertainty with respect to the company's franchise, business model and strategic direction," Fitch said. Without its AAA rating Ambac may be unable to write the top- ranked bond insurance that makes up 74% of its revenue. Ambac may have to quit the business or sell itself, said Robert Haines, an analyst at CreditSights Inc., a bond research firm in New York. The downgrade throws doubt on the ratings of $556 billion in municipal and structured finance debt guaranteed by Ambac. "This makes Ambac insurance toxic," said Matt Fabian, senior analyst and managing director at Municipal Market Advisors in Westport, Connecticut. "The ma...
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Shiller on NYC Real Estate: Ancient Rome Before The Fall
2008-01-17 01:04:00
Shiller on New York: We're Ancient Rome , Right Before the Fall by NY Observer - snip:...When your S&P/Case-Shiller index of home prices came out last year showing record drops, you said things hadn?t been this bad nationally since the Second World War. Yet the sub-prime mortgage scandal hasn?t much affected Manhattan. Are we immune? Firstly, you?re definitely not immune, OK? Manhattan is a unique place, and that does mean that it has different dynamics, but it?s not immune, I can guarantee you that ? If it gets too expensive in New York, people will leave it, no matter what?they can?t afford to live there. And so it?s just not true that New York will keep appreciating independently of everywhere else, I just don?t believe it. Elementary economics say people will always substitute away when the price gets too high, and so they?re doing that.What will the bursting of the real estate bubble in New York look and feel like?It will probably start showing synchrony with the rest of the...
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This Is Not Going To Be Your Father's Recession
2008-01-16 01:51:00
This is not your father's recession by MarketWatch - snips:In the past, when the U.S. economy ran into trouble, there were tried and true remedies that policymakers could implement in order to turn things around. The Federal Reserve would swing into action by cutting interest rates and injecting additional liquidity into the banking system.... the Congress and the president would join in by cutting taxes and increasing government spending... However, this is not your father's recession, thus what worked in his day may not work this time around. Yes, fans, this time it really is different. First you have the housing crisis... it's going to take more than monetary or fiscal ease to get us out of today's jam... Lower interest rates will not be of much help. For one thing, they won't prevent many mortgage loans from resetting to higher rates. For another, as noted above, banks are reluctant to lend while many borrowers don't want to (or can't) borrow. Freezing or otherwise mo...
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Wall Street Vultures Blind To History's Lessons
2008-01-15 01:03:00
50 Cents On The Dollar - The Empire State Building Story by Sudden Debt - snip:Vulture investors are putting together syndicates to purchase US real estate, crowing that they are getting it for fifty cents on the dollar, focusing particularly in "carrion-infested" states like Florida. And Bank of America is buying the whole of Countrywide Financial at a deep discount after its initial $2 billion investment went very sour, very quickly. A little history may serve as a warning to overzealous buzzards. The Empire State Building was completed in record time (one year!) in 1931, costing a total of $41 million ($25 million for the building plus $17 million for the land). Construction costs were half the original estimates because the Great Depression quickly and dramatically cut prices and wages. The owners were John Raskob and a group of wealthy investors from the du Pont, Kaufman and Earl families - hardly unwashed hoi polloi. I imagine they, too, thought they were getting a bargain at ...
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Anna Schwartz - The Fed Reserve High Priestess Slams Central Bank On Credit
2008-01-14 13:26:00
Anna Schwartz blames Fed for sub-prime crisis by Telegraph UK - snip:Anna Schwartz, the revered economist, shares her views on the credit bubble with Ambrose Evans-Pritchard.As rebukes go in the close-knit world of central banking, few hurt as much as the scathing indictment of US Federal Reserve policy by Professor Anna Schwartz. The high priestess of US monetarism - a revered figure at the Fed - says the central bank is itself the chief cause of the credit bubble, and now seems stunned as the consequences of its own actions engulf the financial system. "The new group at the Fed is not equal to the problem that faces it," she says, daring to utter a thought that fellow critics mostly utter sotto voce. (Anna Schwartz wrote a seminal text on the causes of the Great Depression). "They need to speak frankly to the market and acknowledge how bad the problems are, and acknowledge their own failures in letting this happen. This is what is needed to restore confidence," she told The Sunday...
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Where Does Money & Debt Come From?
2008-01-13 18:49:00
The poster at Youtube requested no embedding, therefore you'll have to launch each chapter separately. Slightly inconvenient, but well worth your time.Paul Grignon's 47-minute animated presentation of "Money as Debt " tells in very simple and effective graphic terms what money is and how it is being created. It is an entertaining way to get the message out. The Cowichan Citizens Coalition and its "Duncan Initiative" received high praise from those who previewed it. I recommend it as a painless but hard-hitting educational tool and encourage the widest distribution and use by all groups concerned with the present unsustainable monetary system in Canada and the United States.Click a link to launch each chapter if unable to navigate Youtube:Part 1Part 2Part 3Part 4Part 5 New York City Housing Bubble - The BIG Picture

Testing Voxant Video Feed - Comments Please
2008-01-12 17:24:00
New York City Housing Bubble - The BIG Picture
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Banks Trying To Wiggle Out Of Accounting Rules Amid Credit Crisis
2008-01-12 01:14:00
Banks Plead They Can?t Follow Rules by NYT - snips:When you are shoveling money, keeping track of the paperwork is an awful burden. As the mortgage mess grows, we are learning more and more about just how sloppy things were in the mortgage-issuing business as loans were churned out, carved into securities and sold off. Judges have blocked some foreclosures with rulings that purchasers of mortgages could not prove that they owned them. The buyers of the mortgages complain that it is unfair to ask them to have complied with detailed rules. And now the banks are begging the accounting rule makers to allow them to ignore a rule that has been on the books for almost 15 years. They explain that they never had any idea that they would have to restructure a lot of home mortgages, and thus had no reason to develop systems to deal with the accounting for such restructurings. ?No one anticipated a day when potentially hundreds of thousands of residential mortgage loans would be modified,? sai...
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Real Estate & Financial System On LIfe Support
2008-01-11 04:28:00
Housing: No room for bulls by CNN Money - snip:Three bears took on a lone bull at a real estate conference debate in New York this week. Guess who won? (the panel: Nouriel Roubini, Barry Ritholtz, Urbandigs Noah Rosenblatt, and Prudential Douglas Elliman's CEO Dottie Herman)... Even a few months ago, it seemed like a good idea to hold a debate between real estate bulls and bears. But with home sales spiraling and the outlook getting gloomier, it was hard to find a single optimist at a recent panel discussion on the forecast for the housing market...Realty Check: Tough Timesby Diana Olick at CNBCReporting From The NYC Conference Video: NYC Real Estate Connect Bear vs Bull Debate - 54minA Scary Tidbit by Naked Capitalism - snip:Forgive me, but we are going to be a bit lean on posts tonight. I had too much to drink with someone who is terribly plugged in (security clearances AND knows tons of people in academia and the officialdom personally, both here and overseas). Unfortunately...
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Need A Job In NYC Next Year - Good Luck !
2008-01-10 01:08:00
NYC economic slump! '08 forecast, few new jobs, ballooning deficitby NY Daily News - snip:Need a job? Good luck. New York will gain just 500 jobs this year - if we're lucky - according to a scary new city forecast that sees slowdowns on Wall Street, stagnant real estate prices and an ocean of red ink in the city budget future... "The fiscal picture has dimmed considerably," IBO spokesman Doug Turetsky told the Daily News yesterday. "There is a fairly significant risk that things could get worse." If Wall Street loses even more money this year," the agency expects the city's jobs will shrink by 8,700 this year, rebounding by just 15,000 jobs next year - and that's if the national economy doesn't sink into a recession. "While there appears little reason to think our assumptions are too pessimistic, there is a reasonable chance that they are overly optimistic,... The city housing market also is projected to finally cool down as prices stagnate or fall and fewer homes and apartmen...
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The Housing Ponzi Pyramid Scheme Is No More
2008-01-09 02:25:00
US Financial Pyramid s Crumbling by Bill Gross at PIMCO - snips:My college experience dates so far back that it can only be labeled "ancient history." Still, there are a few seminal lessons I learned at Duke University?... "Ticket Scalping 101" and "Beginning Blackjack"... not far behind would be "Introduction to Pyramid Schemes."... Wall Street and its global lookalikes, of course, are life?s largest colleges where lessons can be mighty expensive and downright bankrupting. The last two decades alone have witnessed pyramid schemes involving savings and loans/junk bonds, the small investor/dot.coms, and now global bonds/subprimes. I could go on and you have your own candidates to be sure, but in each and every case the originator of a surefire "can?t miss" concept collected huge premiums from a willing investment public, only to see the pyramid collapse either of its own merits or from the lack of additional gullible investors. There will be more to come, much like a regular univer...
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Recession & Housing Market Collapse On Tap
2008-01-08 13:16:00
Recession in the US 'has arrived' by BBC - snip:The feared recession in the US economy has already arrived, according to a report from Merrill Lynch. It said that Friday's employment report, which sent shares tumbling worldwide, confirmed that the US is in the first month of a recession...Remarks by Secretary Henry M. Paulson, Jr. on Housing and Capital Market sby US Treasury - snip:...Foreclosure Prevention Efforts... After years of unsustainable price appreciation and lax lending practices, a housing correction was inevitable and necessary. That correction is underway. Over the next two years, we also face an unprecedented wave of 1.8 million subprime mortgage resets, raising the potential of a market failure. Because the industry does not have the capacity to manage this volume, without action, unnecessary foreclosures would result....Why America must have a fiscal stimulusby Lawrence Summers via Financial Times - snip:The odds of a 2008 US recession have surely increased after...
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Auctions For NY Homes Not In Foreclosure Coming To A Hood Near You
2008-01-08 01:48:00
Frustrated Sellers, Take Note by NYT - snips:WESTCHESTER NY - On Jan. 27, Fereydoun and Dolores Fani?s five-bedroom three-bath Stony Point colonial is scheduled to be sold at auction. This is not because the house is in foreclosure, but because the Fanis have been waiting 18 months for a buyer to come along, have already moved elsewhere and are tired of paying for two homes... ?A lot of homeowners are feeling the pinch of the current market, and an auction can expedite the process,? explained Mr. Longly. Mr. and Mrs. Fani, whose mortgage, insurance and other costs on the home run about $5,000 a month, decided to put it on the block because, Mr. Fani said, ?if it sits on the market another six months, it will cost us another $30,000, and we?re running out of patience.? ?We can?t keep carrying two houses,? concluded Mr. Fani, who has two children and owns a limousine service... Bush Can Buy Time As Property Bubble Bursts by Telegraph UK - snip:Bears beware. The New Deal of 2008 is i...
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Can Ya Hear That Big Sucking Sound?
2008-01-06 19:19:00
Forecast for 2008 by Jim Kunstler at Clusterfuck Nation - snip:For the tiny fraction of people who actually pay attention to real events -- those, for instance, who know the difference between Narnia and Kandahar -- the final hours of 2007 leading into the fog-shrouded abyss of 2008 must induce great racking shudders of nausea. Has there ever been a society so exquisitely rigged for implosion? The whole listing, creaking, reeking edifice stands like one of those obsolete Las Vegas pleasure palaces awaiting a mere pulse of electrons to ignite a thousand explosive charges perfectly placed to blow away the structural supports. The inertia holding everything together that I described in last year's forecast finally melted away at mid-summer and events began spooling out of control. Specifically, the massive tonnage of debt-backed securities circulating through the financial sector stood revealed for the mostly worthless bales of paper they truly are, and the investment community was le...
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2008 Economic Forecasts (updated)
2008-01-06 03:01:00
Wall Street Reporter January 3rd Interview with Gary ShillingAUDIO: 2008 Forecast - Housing Market, World Economy, Hard Landing Recession - Length: 30minPresident of A. Gary Shilling & Co., Dr. Shilling is well known for his forecasting record. A poll conducted by Institutional Investor magazine twice ranked him as Wall Street's top economist. Dr. Shilling has been a Forbes columnist since 1983, and his articles appear in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times , and other well known publications.------AUDIO: FSU 2008 Forecasts w/Jim Puplava and Paul L. Kasriel Peter Schiff - Eyes Wide ShutSeeking Alpha - Pedaling Prosperity Propaganda: Rhetoric of Depression?Financial Post - Forget oil, the new global crisis is food in '08Monty Guild Investment Mgmt - 2008 Market CommentaryInvestor Insight - John Mauldin: Forecast 2008, Recession and RecoveryMarketWatch - Economists say 2008 will be a year to forgetGoldseek - Jim Willie: Enter 2008: The System BreaksPrudent Bear - Doug No...
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HELLO - Williamsburg Brooklyn Condo Prices Plunge 10%+ in 2007
2008-01-05 02:51:00
Williamsburg Brokerage Owner: Prices Down '10 to 12% in '07by NY Observer - snips:The owner of one of Williamsburg's biggest brokerage firms, Aptsandlofts.com, said that the Corcoran Group's 2007 market report was "wrong" in estimating that the average price of a condo in the neighborhood had increased 8 percent since 2006. David Maundrell told The Observer on Friday afternoon that "there was no way" that the average price of a condo in the Williamsburg market had risen from $817,000 in 2006 to $880,000 in 2007, as the Corcoran report concludes. "Their data is wrong. We've seen the market come down 10 to 12% across the board since it peaked in the beggining of 2006," he said. "Prices were astronomically high, even inflated so they had to come down," Mr. Maundrell explained of the causes for the slump. "Plus there has been a lot more development and competition, and sales were also impacted by [interest] rates, which helped the rental market in 2007"... More residential devel...
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The Facts Are In - Fantasy Island Still Exists
2008-01-04 02:16:00
Below are some 'facts' on the skewed Manhattan reports in which 'expert real estate industry' bulls have their panties all in a bunch about... FYI, the pricing trend is still DOWN. Real Estate corrections are notorioulsy a slow train wreck in process, not an event. And really, who cares about fantasy island? Homeowners in the 4 surrounding boroughs and outer tri-state suburbs are getting whacked. Ladies and Gentlemen, there is a much bigger picture to see here, so don't let blind kool-aid drinkers have you believe they can see beyond their own self-interests.Housing Tracker MLS Data For NY MetroPrudential Douglas Elliman Q4 2007 Manhattan Market Overviewby True Gotham - snips:...MY Key Takeaways that can't be ignored (IMHO): - Median sales price up 6.4% from same quarter last year but down 1.7% from 3rd quarter of this year. It remains to be seen as to whether or not we will see a trend in decreasing median prices. - Listing inventory decreased 13.5% from same period last y...
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800,000 Entered Foreclosure In 2nd Half 2007
2008-01-03 01:18:00
Mortgage of Mass Destruction, Foreclosure Crisis Is Far From Being Fixedby Philadelphia Daily - snip:TOO MANY FAMILIES in this country have been celebrating the holiday season under a shadow of dread -the prospect of losing their homes. The national mortgage meltdown, fueled by an explosion of risky subprime mortgages, is in full swing. In just the last six months, about 800,000 homeowners have entered foreclosure. That's right: 800,000 people who have or are about to lose their homes, with millions more estimated over the next few years as adjustable-rate mortgages continue to reset to much higher, unaffordable levels. That number is hard to comprehend. Maybe that explains why President Bush, Congress and the Fed have yet to react with the proper degree of urgency. Maybe they are still trying to grasp what those numbers mean. Although they have taken action recently to help some homeowners from losing their homes, that action will have about as much impact as washing the windows...
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