Home Sales Hit Slowest Pace in Four Years
June 25th, 2007Via: Yahoo / AP:
Reflecting further housing troubles, sales of existing homes fell in May to the lowest level in four years while the median home price dropped for a record 10th consecutive month.
The National Association of Realtors reported Monday that sales of existing single-family homes and condominiums dropped by 0.3 percent to 5.99 million units in May, the slowest sales pace since June of 2003.
The median price of a home sold last month dropped to $223,700, down 2.1 percent from a year ago. It marked the 10th straight price decline compared with a year ago, the longest stretch of weakness on record.
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There are two sides to every story.
The 1250 sq. ft. house across the street from where I live in California, listed a month ago at $850,000, sold two weeks ago for $1,100,000 after 16 bids. My father’s 1750 sq. ft. house elsewhere in California just sold for $288,000, listed at $340,000 two months ago. But 24 months ago the going price for a comparable home on the same block was about $180,000.
Prices here in OR are starting to drop, at first it was the expensive homes1 million and up, but now even thecheaper homes are having to drop prices, as inventory is definitely going up…its all those folks who got 2 year ARMS are not being forced to sell as they can’t afford the payments anymore…Its becoming a buyers market again, except this time there aren’t very many buyers around…most of them don’t qualify for the loans.
The bottom line is that the average house is NOT afordable to the average Americans finances.
Home prices are too high for the average person
Its commone sense that home prices need to come down ALOT in price.
I also feel that the reason house prices have risen, is actually due to the American dollar loosing so much value on the international scale. Thus needing more “dollars” to purchase the same value of American land. Unfortunatly our average personal income has not as accuratly risen along with the true inflation of our dollar. We are in BIG trouble as most average folks do not realize this and politicians are no where near adressing the issue and explaining how much trouble we are actually in. It would scare the economy into a standstill.
I listen to Marketplace on NPR – interesting voice on this character – but their numbers say that in the U.S. “we’ve got the biggest overhang of unsold houses in this country in the past 15 years. And sales are still sliding.” Bear Sterns needs to borrow $10 billion to bail out their subprime fund? Sweet.
This is worth a listen/read sans the initial commercial.
http://marketplace.publicradio.org/shows/2007/06/25/PM200706253.html
I listen to Marketplace, too, as a kind of sick habit, on the podcast. Hiking with my dog through a semi-rural park in a very big / ugly U.S. city, it sort of makes me laugh to hear the NPR soft yuppie bullshit about the markets.
It’s also funny how they are compelled to explain every common business/economics term, as if the listeners are MySpace rap-metal idiots.
What I am amazed at is the power of the media etc to cover up the collapse of the market. I have three friends in SEA who are realtors, who have always said “SEA is a highly desired area to live, market will always be good”. None of them has sold a house in 5 months.
Except for the small highly desirable places etc, like waterfront properties and people who have so much money the market isnt an issue…I think the TPTB are really working to cover up this crisis and put alot of spin on it to keep the illusion going.
I for one welcome the lower prices. I’m planning to buy land in Oregon where I can hunker down and ride this thing out.