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Zombie Housing Market Chronicles - Fed Fails Again To Stimulate A Housing Recovery
While today the association of real estate advertising agents known as the NAR will tell us that the home market is improving - an economic observation which we will completely ignore as any data out of the NAR is now proven to be manipulated and fraudulent, a far better indication of the ongoing implosion in the housing market, and more importantly - the sheer powerlessness of the Fed to do anything about it - came out of the latest weekly Mortgage Brokers Association, which showed that refi applications were down 4.8% W/W, while purchases slid 2.9%, after collapsing 8.4% in the past week. This has taken the Purchase Application index back to the September lows, which just happens to be the lowest print in 16 years! And while this in itself would be ok if not exactly good, it took place at a time when the 30 year mortgage rate was down to all time record lows! In other words, Bernanke's sole prescription to fix the broken housing market diagnosis - low mortgage rates, has now been proven to be a complete disaster, even as Obama does everything in his power to get debt repudiation for deadbeats (at the expense of everyone else of course) and fails. So: what's the next plan?
One would think record low mortgage rates would be good for the housing market: one would be dead wrong.
Is this is what a housing recovery looks like?
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There's always a first time.
Methinks we need a massive new stimulus package to pay off all the mortgages of those who are "under water" or have stopped paying on their mortgages.
This is fair, because those that can afford to pay their mortgage are doing so on a timely basis and need no such help.
This would solve the housing crisis right away.
"The only solution to the debt crisis, is more debt"
Paul Krugman
Economist/Nobel Winner/Professor/NY Times blogger/Ivy Leaguer/Genius/All-Around Douchebag
You are probably not far from reality. Bernanke has been just begging to do his LSAP's of the mortgage market. I mean why not? We all know he is such a knowledgable man who studied the great depression. We are so f'd. Carry on.
How about lower the prices to affordability?
Price will reflect wages and labor market. So, the prices still need to come down.. And when interest rates finally do go up, you will see a direct (inverse) correlation with the two.. prices and interest rates... People are payment sensitive..
Housing is desperately seeking a clearing price.
The odds of getting an above expectation housing number in 5 minutes are very high (but aren't they always these days lol)
The dispshit policy makers don't want to let prices drop... Idiots.
All this talk of lowest ever mortgage rates. WTF?!? It's the monthly payment that drives everything, and if you can't afford the MP at current rates, it's the PRICE, STUPID.
This is the same stupidity that extended the Great Depression. Whereas the depression of 1921 cleared entirely in 18 mos (much like all prior "depressions"), the GREAT was GREAT only because Hoover (FDR-Lite) and FDR started price fixing everything at prices that would not clear. These morons had farmers tilling crops, dumping milk, slaughtering pigs, etc, all to "help the farmer by keeping prices stable"... never mind, the average Joe couldn't afford a freaking apple with prices kept artificially high.
Then there were the new labor rules. And then the Supreme Court was going to throw it all out as unconstitutional. And then FDR was going to illegally disband the Supreme Court to stack it with Fabian Socialist Flunkies, so the Court panicked and decided on the lesser of two evils: Socialism vs. dictatorship.
Exactly...there is no problem that price cannot fix. But that is capitalism....and so out of vogue now, and apparently for years to come.
Prospective buyers, sellers, and investors eagerly await the next singularly sanguine pronouncement from everyone's favorite spinner, Lawrence Yun. Pull up a chair and watch him gyrate uncontrollably. You'll enjoy the show.
http://man.century21firstre.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/Dr...
+100
BOOM! hit the nail on the head.
What these corporate assholes who expect us to be happy with our (for most part) shitty wages and high taxes don't understand is the fact that consumer WILL ADAPT to the conditions in order to keep their lives afloat. It's fiscal evolution.
If that means cutting out the cable bill, not going out to restaurants, and paying down debt - we will do that. I've done that, and am going to be in the life black for the first time since I was 18 at the end of the year. I'm only part of 10% of my age bracket to be like this.
Housing is becoming more unattainable, especially to the younger generation, as the crushing debt of our financial serfdom continues to contract. It's simply fiscal evolution, and it effects the entire econ-eco-sytem around us, because without commerce, there is no jobs, and without jobs, there isn't any wealth amongst potential new home owners to make a down payment on a loan, never mind the entire house.
You also have a confidence issue in banks. Do they actually have the money they are lending you? Are they going to suddenly change the terms of my mortgage whenever a toaster oven pops up? Do I really want to go and give these assholes more leverage to own my ass if *shit hapens* and my wealth/job evaporates with the market?
18-30 year olds have almost NO cash after paying rent, student loans, cell phone bill, food, gas, and for some, the occasional kid or two. Out of my peers in the Boston area, I only know of *one* who has bought a house. This is out of 150+ people. And BTW, that person who did buy a house (Optomitrist), had to go to Maryland to afford it.
Which leads to another problem: when people want to buy a home, they prefer to do it in a place near their family and friends. hey really don't want to move to the AZ or MI suburbs, where homes are cheap. The reason? No jobs. All of the jobs that pay average-on-up, are in the high cost areas like NY/CA/MA/IL. This drives home prices up, and since the potential young buyer is in student loan debt (and cc debt), and the Babu Boomer is also in cc debt.....well, lets just say its looking really bullish for rich people to buy that 2nd of 3rd home.
This is what happens when you have a bunch of rich people who also happen to be religiously insane. Evolution is kind of an important concept to understand markets, as it is the barometer on how consumers (our society's tax base) works.
It's even simpler. People stop paying their mortgage, and continue watching cable, going out, etc. Once the effects of the robo-signing settlement engage, those same people will actually lose their homes and be forced to start paying rent. There goes cable, going out, etc. The Settlement is the black swan.
Give it about 5 years.
While Fannie and Freddie were implemented and given a rather large line-of-credit to "make housing affordable", those same entities, along with the Fed, are being utilized to keep housing prices inflated. Welcome to the surreal world of government created problems and the unintended consequences of the government created "solutions".
Here is what is happening overall. It may not be happening to you. It may not be happening in your part of the country (yet). Not every snowflake down the hillside joins the avalanche at the same time.
Some people were overextended financially. Not enough savings. Too much debt. Some of this subset got sick. In some couples, one of the spouses got laid off. These were the first to fall off the financial cliff. They had little choice but to let their homes fall into foreclosure. They had paid 20% down, but the collapse of the real estate market had put them underwater on their mortgages. Others maintained their jobs and their health. But there is still time for adversity to strike them, also. It happens every day.
Other people had planned for some adversity. They had savings. They had an IRA or a 401(k). Then one of the spouses lost their job. Maybe they found a new one, but at one-third the previous pay. The other spouse hasn't had a raise in ten years. Instead, co-pays for health coverage increased. The price of gas increased. The price of food increased. No amount of household budget cost-cutting solved the problem, but spending the IRA and taking out loans against the 401(k) filled the gap for awhile. Then they had to let their houses go, too. This is an ongoing process. More people fall into this group every day. It is one reason that their have been such large outflows from capital markets over the past several years, and why the rate of foreclosures remains persistently high.
Sometimes people got in trouble just by following the conventional wisdom in America as to how to live your life. Young families put 20% down on a home big enough to house their growing families. They did so with optimism and a belief that the future would bring raises and better job opportunities. Instead, the future brought wage cut-backs, and they slowly slipped into financial oblivion, and they had to let the house go.
Other folks with skills in demand, but not in their immediate locale, just walk away our of necessity. They have to relocate to work and get a paycheck. The bank is left with another empty home.
Lots of other folks, rather than renting or buying, move back in with Mom and Dad. I wonder how many multi-family households have popped up since 2005? I suspect it is a surprising large number, especially if you include those 20 and 30-year olds who can't afford to move out.
Sure, a lot a doofuses got caught flipping homes for what they thought would be perpetual capital gains. Others jumped at the chance of owning a home when they probably knew in the back of their minds that the payments would be more than they could handle. Stupid construction companies, rather than lose their skilled tradesmen, built a lot of spec homes in the false hope they might actually sell them to somebody. Those homes are still vacant and rotting.
This is only the beginning of the avalanche.
Coming soon, to your neighborhood. Or maybe the avalance has already run through your neck of the woods.
Since nobody who needs a mortgage to buy a home can qualify for one, "affordable" means prices so low that a typical worker can pay cash for it. But I don't think we will get that far, except for inside the city limits of slummy large cities. But you can't have a job living in such places, since your "neighbors" will steal you blind while you are at work.
Actually, if pushed a little to predict the future, I think that eventually some large new hedge fund will figure out a way to buy millions of residential homes and offer them as rentals. The management costs for looking after the rentals seems to have discouraged such projects so far, but as the cost of acquiring the homes diminishes, some feudal lords will figure it is worth the risk. I hear that the major mortgage banks are trying to figure out how to bundle thousands of foreclosed homes in a single offering, thereby lowering their transactional costs. They appear to have finally figured out that withholding homes from the market, although it might artificially buoy prices, results in an inventory of rotted and unsaleable homes.
Look for these transactions to involve the bundling and sale of all of the homes in one geographical location to one investor, so that the investor can subsequently hold a virtual monopoly on rental home pricing.
There are lots of special interests fighting to create the illusion that home prices are stable or even rising. Cities, counties, and school districts all over the country would collapse overnight if current property values were honestly assessed. The realtors and builders cannot afford to let you understand that only an imbecile would purchase a home that is presently occupied by the owners, or buy a new home, as long as perfectly fine foreclosed homes are on the market for 50% less in price. Politicians don't want to own the problem, and they have decided that the best political strategy is to deny its depth and its extent, and trumpet "loan modification" programs.
The loan modification programs hyped by the policitions are carefully designed to benefit nobody but the lenders. They are used to syphon off what little wealth the homeowner possesses on the pretext of catching up on the mortgage arrears under circumstances where the homeowner's assets whoud be exempt in a Chapter 7 bankruptcy filing. They dangle the hope of remaining in the home in exchange for the voluntary delivery of wealth they could not touch in a bankruptcy. The lenders get a government loan guarantee in the process, and they know they are squeezing the homeowner so severely on their new budget that default a year or so down the road is inevitable, anyway. Then they collect the full value of the loan from the taxpayers.
But, not to worry. When Foxconn opens up its American subsidiaries, folks can reside in dormitories next to the factory, and view it as an upgrade from a tent in the wintertime woods.
In order for all of this to get fixed, I think it is unassailable logic to conclude that homes must become affordable for the average American worker. But the wages of the typical American worker have to become "affordable" to their employers when measured against the wages found in the rest of the global village before we can figure out what will be affordable in the way of a home price. Only then will the housing market stabilize. I'm not happy about this reality, but I don't see much point in denying it.
Fuck you, how about we start by rewarding those who have been paying their mortgages, period? You want a fucking recovery? Reward good behavior and prosecute the fucking fraud, re-establish the rule of law. Do that and confidence and faith will be restored and you will have a DOW 50,000 in no time.
By I digress, you satire is appreciated.
Bumper Stickers:
Squatters are people, too.
I Squat and I Vote
I Got Boned Keeping Up with the Jones's
I upmod you for sentiment, but how 'bout the government stop picking winners and losers? How 'bout we end the Fed? How 'bout the government stop borrowing money? /rant
Isn't that what Obama Refinance plan does?
The current underwater mortgages are liabilities to the banks. If the home owner defaults, the bank takes the loss.
With the Obama Refinance plan, the newly Refinanced mortgage is now insured by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac (aka it becomes a liability to the taxpayer). The bank of the original underwater mortgage walks away with 100 cents on the dollar for the bubble priced property when the mortgage is refinanced.
here's a link to my reference
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/obama-lays-out-his-latest-mortgage-plan
I have, reluctantly, paid my mortgage on time for 5-years. While currently underwater, I am in the middle of a no income verification, no asset verification, no appraisal refinance. So much fun. WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
No way. Everyone here says that lending standards are getting tighter. You must not be telling the truth.
Sold my house in Texas in January of 2011. Got asking price from some newlyweds in their mid-late 20's. Would've take quite a bit less, but they didn't even ask. I almost fell out of my chair when I saw that they were only required to put 1.5% down on an FHA loan. I think they lost their equity before we walked out of the title company's office. (BTW, after paying all debt, every stinking penny purchased phys gold and silver).
Like Greg Focker, I rent now, and think I am a genius.
Yeah, I was not saying home owners should not get a break. Just saying every damn program benefits banks at taxpayer expense. The program should be structured so banks take the loss for their own risky behavior. Good luck with the mortgage.
Methinks we need a massive new stimulus package to pay off all the mortgages of those who are "under water" or have stopped paying on their mortgages.
This is fair, because those that can afford to pay their mortgage are doing so on a timely basis and need no such help.
Nice. Big ol' money velocity boost like that just might get a loaf of bread on par with a house at...oh...$5,000.
Funny. I thought Obummmer fixed this two weeks ago.
Fail!!
I think the Treasury should buy homes and rent them, at least the Treasury would get a real asset instead of the Fed propping up pieces of paper and the Treadury could get some income. I guess communism and state control is just how an insolvent state restore "some" balance sheet during hyperinflation. France confiscated the Clerge' assets during its hyperinflationary revolution. Confiscation happened in 1917 (400% inflation) in Russia as well as a in China in 1948 which was also hyperinflationary. I guess purchaing assets with counterfeited money is also confiscation, that happened with Assignats inthe French revolution, LBO is the same thing.
What's the next plan? RAISE THE FREAKIN INTEREST RATES.
There are enough people on the sidelines (me included) that feel they have noth'in but time to buy that vacation/retirement property ... if I were told that the easing had come to an end and starting at the next FED meeting they would be initiating their period of tightening ... well lets just say I'd be on the next plane to Florida to lock in my once-in-a-lifetime low rates.
But as long as rates are low, what's the hurry? -- if I wait another year or two I'll probably get the house for 10%-20% below where it is today AND get that absurdly low rate ...
Its really mind blowing to me that they don't see that.
it's mindblowing to think that you believe that there are enough people on the sidelines to do anything other than cause a deadcat.
The banks can barely lend money for free at this point.
I know sometimes it seems like EVERYBODY in America has lost their job and EVERYBODY is underwater on their mortgage or is in foreclosure. But it just isn't true.
30% of all homes in the United States are owned outright with no mortgage at all. Many professions/industries have fared very well during this recession ... engineering/defense, computer science, nurses/ pharmacists/ dentists ...
I suspect my demographic is bigger than you think.
I agree, I am "sidelined" in both cash and physical. I won't do shit unless I know that the actual rule of law will be enforced. The paper-pushers are clearly getting desperate, just wait. why take a risk now, especially when little guys actually have to shoulder that risk while big corporations make bad decisions and get bailed out. For now, simply front-running the predictable bad behavior is much more lucitive.
The only issue with raising interest rates is debt-servicing.
Precisely as Von Mises wrote about it before the first Great Depression: Each intervention sowes the seeds of the next, until eventually the economy / prices become so distorted, the entreprenuerial classes will cease investing and engaging in ordinary commerce -- since the rule of law is gone -- and will engage instead in speculatively front-running the policy makers.
Why risk capital trying to run a business overburdened by technocrat regulation, taxes, dwindling profits, when you can simply play the monetary intervention speculative trades?
I sense a "chicken/egg" sort of issue here. Financial speculation is like jerking off without coming unless prices are destabilized to the point where large movements up and down make the speculation more likely to pay off big time. The more speculators that join the game, the bigger the price swings. It also helps if the Fed prints a couple of trillion dollars for the banks to forward to their prop desks. At some point, speculation will become more profitable than doing any sort of real work.
Imagine if the government bailed out the suckers who lost their shirts in the local casino? Pretty soon, there would be lines around the block just to get inside so you could elbox your way up to the craps table.
Over time, it looks to me like a downward spiral would commence. I'm not sure I'd lay the blame on the government as being the first cause. The easy money gained via MBS and CDS sales had at least as much to do with it. It's kind of pointless presently to point the finger of blame across the vortex while everyone is spiraling down the drain.
LawsofPhysics, totally agree. Long time to be in cash but the 'rule-changing' and lack of prosecution of simple stuff is mind boggling.
I know a half dozen people including me on the sidelines right now. Now is looking really nice except for that wave tsunami of foreclosures that's about to hit the market. I'm guessing the "fix" of the bank fraud situation is behind the week/week drop. A lot of people are waiting for some truly great buys in a few months. Hope those rates are still there.
Gold dealers are doing great too.
WTF "I'd be on the next plane"
10%-20% off of $30k for a doublewide ... go on take the plunge
http://investmentwatchblog.com/107-months-of-inventory-how-many-months-i...
The FED failed? No WAY. I can not believe it...sarc
Ouch, long mud and grass huts.
I hope at least Obama is still paying Peggy Joseph's mortgage...
Wow you mean those high quality ,low wage jobs added didnt push those suckers into overextending themselves(again) to buy a home this time? Who woulda thunk it!?
Oh snap, Binky Bennie has a 30+% of his 3 trillion portfolio in shit mortgages!
Calm down Tyler. February is always the slowest month of the year, every year.
There will be no housing BOOM, but we are seeing a market regain its legs at levels that reflect a steady, healthy market, albeit that is still months away. The bubble disrupted the normal cycle, but we will return to the mean.
I'm guessing that this post is sarcasm, but if not... the mean to which you refer is still a ways below where we are now. The gov'ts attempt to re-inflate the bubble disrupted the return to the mean, but only for a short while. To return to a number that make snse historically, prices would need to come down another 20%+... but our entire monetary system will collapse before that happens.. after that, all bets are off.
Yep, if we're reverting back to the mean, we have a ways to go, yet. Not to mention, when bubbles pop, they generally snap back to below the mean before recovering to the mean. So, make that 20% more like 40% and then maybe a recovery. If the financial system survives.
Great logic. The fed can create bubbles but they are inept at reinflating them? Makes no sense. If they want housing to appreciate in nominal terms they will appreciate in nomincal terms.
What is your point about a return to the mean being way below where we are now? No one said it wasn't.
Your 20% number is pulled out of where the sun don't shine. In gold terms housing has never been cheaper. Rents are starting to exceed 30 year mortgages. Fannie and Freddie are making it easier and easier to buy houses.
What makes no sense... are you watching? Do you not think that the housing bubble was fed induced? As Paul Krugman told us, "To fight this recession the Fed needs more than a snapback; it needs soaring household spending to offset moribund business investment. And to do that, as Paul McCulley of Pimco put it, Alan Greenspan needs to create a housing bubble to replace the Nasdaq bubble" - which is exactly what Greenspan did. But once you go zirp, there isn't a whole lot of additional juice the fed can inject. So they got all creative with other gov't backed sweeteners and did have some success in slowing the collapse... but gravity will win.
They have not even begun to get started in their efforts. These are beauracracies stuff doesnt happen over night. Here is a list of things they can do
even lower mortgage rates
land banks
easier borrowing terms from fannie and freddie
more tax incentives
force banks to lend
dump piles and piles of money from helicopters eventually people will look for some refuge. Facebook or something with utility.
These end game acts of desperation won't yield success, IMO. But I shouldn't underestimate the stupidity of people. But stupid people will still need a job of some sort to make any of this work. Perhaps we should build a few pyramids to the moon or mars.
Why don't you pull up a chart of IWM.
And here is pretty much all of the data that you need http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/case-shiller-cha... - That dotted line is where prices in a normal world would need to go. And that dotted line only returns us to where prices should be in a market that has been propped up for generations. The "American Dream of Home Ownership" bullshit that has been pawned off on the sheeple. Who knows what the real value is. But we'll get there... and it's a lot lower than where we are now.
I think if you increased the time period on that and stepped far enough back, you'd see a 'U'.
head, meet sand.
I see and review this data daily on my regional market. Average sales price for January 2012 was 17% below January 2011. Market inventory is also down 18%. We are bottoming.
Still a long way to go before we see appreciation, so I need to get back to work. Y'all keep busy growing those dreadlocks and sniping at the producers.
I kind of had you pegged as a real estate pimp with those posts you made, you mean you actually produce something? Sorry about the miss identification, this country needs more producers.
Mortgage Broker?
Fed prints some fiat and you middle-man it and then provide the home "buyer" with newly created debt while skimming some off the top for your "services"?
Producing paper?
I produce paper too. I thought I was a parasite but now I know I can look down my nose at all those dread lock growers.
Although, I build stuff on the weekends for nothing. Still a loser I guess.
*IF* any housing recovery begins to occur, it will be short-lived because interest rates will begin to rise and drop prices to new lows.
Excellent, CB. This is the point that most people miss. Interest rates go up at all, the artificial floor underneath the housing market crumbles.
Not to mention, there has been a demographic shift that may be slow to change. All those empty houses and all the for rent signs I see everywhere. Where all all the people who used to live in those houses? Families have moved in together. That changes that have taken place in our society the last few years, may take longer for that to reverse than a simple drop in house prices, or a stimulation package can bring about.
Why and how are interest rates going to rise? When you have a central bank that can buy unlimited quantities of bonds from the government there is no reason to believe they will rise unless inflation raged out of control. The instant it they suspect it was going to rage out of control you will start to hear talk of them raising rates which will cause a deflation scare and asset prices to crash and a flight to cash which will put a stop to the price rises while they continue to buy the bonds.
I think it was all just a thought experiment...
The REALITY experiment is that we're all Japanese now... Kampai!
Actually the japanese are us now. They had very modest growth of money while we have been tripling. They recently have started to follow the US lead.
I'm my own grandpa...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7AvG6q_iTcA&feature=related
Yes, Ben getting the mortgage rate to historic lows will make people run out and spend $150k+ on something. That is unless somebody with ultimate control comes out and states that these rates will be inplace for the next few years. In that case those same people might acutally wait for prices to decline further knowing that interest rates are set by a cartel and will not be going anywhere.
150k where there are no jobs maybe or in an exurban asteroid belt.
Who's with me to retake Detroilet? We can buy the city for 150k and just bulldoze shit
too late trav
http://www.thedeathofamerica.org/images/shanghai-detroit.jpg
Chief ... Can you read a chart? This is not a one month off.
Really... you're serious... macro factors are involved? Like population growth? obsolescence? migration trends? Gee... never thought of that.
"steady healthy market"
that's funny
Yeah yeah sure. More importantly, it will be what Propaganda Chief Carney says is really happening in the housing market. That's what the lemmings listen to, and therefore is the reality.
Neat - oil consumption is about where it was 16 years ago too: http://205.254.135.7/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=pet&s=wrpupus2&f=4
So we have less oil than 16 years ago? Currency worth less? A little of each?
2d chart looks like exactly labor participation chart.
as long as no recovery in labor market, no recovery in housing..
no labor recevery as long as USA corps. keeep on shipping middle class jobs
in Asia..
#SOLUTION
END THE 'GLOBALISATION', STOP BUYING JUNKS FROM CHINA//VEITNAM/ETC AND ERECT IMPORT TARIFFS FOR LOW COST PRODUCING COUNTIRES..
USA must trade w/ Germany/GB/Feance/Canada.. let suckers in S.Asia trade between themselves.
alx
Already happening. Plants are coming home and this trend will continue. Most will locate in the southern US since labor unions are not as strong down here.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204880404577229252169260694.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
The "trend" might continue if the COGS of the products made here are competitive with the COGS of the products made abroad. Major corporations are not likely going to sacrifice profitability just to be patriotic.
Yeah... I am sure CAT didn't analyze any of that before making this small decision.
Moving a manufacturing center from Japan to the US is one thing. Moving production from China (for example) to the US is quite another. Japan is hardly a low-cost location for manufacturing.
You're right. Maybe we should send it back to Japan and request someone move a factory from China instead.
The point of my post, brainiac, is that Japan is a relatively high-cost manufacturing location. Moving production from Japan to the USA may not have much of an adverse impact upon COGS. Generally speaking, China is a lower-cost manufacturing location. Relocating production from China to the USA could have a significant impact upon COGS. Therefore, it would be more telling if production of goods were to be relocated from China to the USA.
"Plants are coming home and this trend will continue." - Chief KnockASomeSenseIntoMe The impact upon COGS is a driving factor in such decisions.
what do you expect when we have representative democracy?
http://samplocracy.wordpress.com
"So: what's the next plan?"
Central Banks around the world will print enough fiat currency to purchase every distressed asset on Earth???...
YEP! Operation 'Banksters Purchase Earth with Fake Money'....ENGAGE!
Why stop with the Earth?
After all, there's NEXT YEARS bonuses to think about too you know...
Pretty hard to have a 'housing recovery' when everyone is broke and crippled by real inflation....BESIDES who says the housing bubble SHOULD be re-inflated anyway!
'Housing recovery' to where, 'McMansion bubble' previous highs? These people are MANIACS!
So FED has pumped $7 trillion into TBTF BANK coffers....and expects that ridiculous bubble to be re-blown? Fuckin idiots, if thats what they actually believe!
Yeah, fuck anybody who says the housing market needs to "recover".
House prices need to continue to decline, not increase. A house is a fucking place to eat, sleep, and shit. Not make you rich when you flip it.
Ok I got to do one more post before I get back to work.
EVERYONE NEEDS HOUSING TO RECOVER. It is the lynchpin of our economy. Consider this - there have been 11 recessions in the US. A housing recovery has led us out of nine.
We came out of the other two with WORLD WAR. Not sure the whinny entilted children who are occupying crap have the toughness for that. Try camping out in protest of the Red China army seizing oil resources or agricultural fields of South America, and see how far that gets ya.
Chief...it aint gonna happen. 'Housing recovery again' my ass, they will never pump another one, the last one was built on free EZ credit and $25 oil. Its OVER man!
Then get ready for one bad fucking war buddy. We repair the floor, or fall through it.
And I am not defending or wanting another bubble episode, but a sustained healthy market with reasonable appreciation like we had from 1988 through 2001.
Slow and steady growth to match demand is all we need. As long as our population is growing, we need that. Accept the reality.
The problem is that you are asking that people accept the "reality" of a dream. When the growth needed doesnt happen in the real world (as opposed to fictitious statistics)- then what? How do we repair the floor when broke and all credit is maxed out? You seem to think that we will get something because we "need" it, which I would point out is the core of entitlement mentality which you seem opposed to.
What I get from your comment is that it must happen therefore it will, many believe that what you are depending on is not realistic or going to happen. Housing was a bubble that must and will deflate further, trying to reinflate a punctured balloon is not desirable. Yes, people that thought a place to live was an investment are going to take it in the teeth. Risk is part of the system, and the fact that there was a mass delusion that people thought was reality doesnt change that. You think the bottom is near, many (including myself) think it is still years away. We will see, but I think you will be disappointed.
All I know is my market, and we are busy. Properties that are realisticly priced will sell with 90 days. If the owners are still asking fantasy prices, they won't sell period.
Sorry to disapoint the anarchist who want everyone to be wiped out, but there is a good market when value is reasonable on quality property and this applies very much to income producing property (NON RETAIL) apartments, medical facilities, warehouses...etc.
Are there still over leveraged fantasy sellers? You bet! Are there a lot of foreclosures in the pipeline? Absolutely!
But as we speak there is also revitalization. A local hotel which was foreclosed on, then turned into a floop house, is being razed today for new development about a Tiger Woods seven iron from my office.
I know you saw the CAT announcement. I recently sold land to a hotel developer to build a new seven story rpoject to be finished before the end of 2012. You can not kill this economy! Slow it down... yes.... kill it ...never.
Even if the dollar disapears, we will trade in silver, or corn, or goats, but America will progress... no matter how much you don't want it to.
Why yes, everyone who disagrees with you and thinks youre hitting the Hopium pipe a little to hard there Chief is an anarchist who hates American progress.
How brilliant, what a stellar intellect.
I agree 100%!
there really is no arguing with the majority of people on this site. they are a study in contradictions. They think the central banks control the world but have not control of the housing market. They make stuff up like "no one has any money" when money supply has tripled. They claim no one is lending when the standards for lending have not gotten much harder or even less hard than they were during the boom.
Main thing to remember in speculation is to copper the public bet. When there is blood on the steets or every zerohedger is screaming it can never happen... buy. The majority on this site will be paying one months rent for every two mortgage payment they could have had and wondering what in the hell happened to their net worth.
Yeah... I agree. I used to love ZH, but it has been taken over by coffee house intelectuals that know a hell of a lot more about business than me, even after my 25 years in the trenches.
Guess I should hit starbucks and just sit it out like the rest of them. I'm sure my kids will figure out a way to eat.
1988 to 2001 was healthy? Fed pumped in the aftermath of the S&L crisis and blew another bubble leading to the dot com bust!
Like all the contorted thinking on this site. Central Bankers control the world. Central bankers have not control of the world. Central banks and gov created the first bubble, central banks and gov cant create another bubble. Last bubble was built on ez credit but this one cant be. Get your story straight. Which is it?
And thanks for letting me know its over man. Just like it was over for the housing market in Weimer Germany. Because you shout something doesnt make it true.
I dont know why any sane person would have down voted your post...the 'housing get rich quick' scheme was an obvious failure halfway thru it! A house is a place to live, not a miracle get rich fast scheme! Americans need to be taught a lesson, you cant 'buy' something 1 day, and the next refinance it for a $10,000 gain, thats INSANITY!
Exactly. The Church of the NAR has made housing a sacrament of the US economy, right up there with motherhood, baseball, and apple pie. This underlying meme has been profoundly destructive of our national wealth, a black-hole of malinvestment spewing out reams of anti-equity, absorbing/negating all positive capital it touches.
"A house is not a home" (no shit)... a house is simply what it's become: the largest single consumer durable in the economy; treat it as such.
And yes... the NAR is full of shit!
They need to keep priming the pump. Home ownership is the last bastion of middle-class self-suffficency left in this tattered economy of ours. If the sheeple feel their homes are worth nothing, coupled with rising energy and food costs, the ever-present fear of losing your job, etc. etc., they will vote or riot accordingly.
Feds cant have that now can they...
They want the riots, at some point. Maybe this week maybe not for a year but its coming just the same.
Yep. Approximately 85-90% of the nation's mortgages are on the books of that Enron-esque off-balance sheet ponzi scheme known as the FHA/Fannie/Freddie cabal. Most of those are crap. Good luck with that America.
http://youtu.be/plNsdvWHIFo- Come on...you want to click it...trust me it's germane...
Mortgages applications are down because people are using cash money. 40% of purchases in phoenix metro were with that rapidly devaluing cold hard cash.
First markets to rebound are the ones that crashed first, Las Vegas, Phoenix and parts of Florida are all seeing prices firming and some appreciation.
And to answer this question "So: what's the next plan?" Even lower rates. 2% seems about right. with inflation at about 5% people with cash will start to scramble to get in. Too many incentives not to (depreciation, income, tax deductions)
Don't fight the fed.
Sales in vegas are increasing but prices are still falling. Without jobs and income gains prices can't rise, and speculators will have to hold those houses as rentals. Not sure they want that, because people without jobs don't pay rent for long.
That is a tired and old argument. First even aggressive unemployment numbers at lets say 13% are only 6 points higher. Most of those people could never afford a home anyway. Incomes are depressed but not by 50% like the housnig market is, meaning homes have not been cheaper in nearly 10 years than they are right now while incomes maybe down 10-20%
Also regarding incomes you bettter check how much federal workers are making, It is not less than they were in 2007.
One other point tons of people are buying with cash. There are trillions sitting on the sideline. Lots of people have lost complete faith in the stock market and are looking for some tangible asset to park their ever devaluing cash.
Remember everyone is not broke. If you have $100k and could put it in a bank, on wall street or invest in a rental home that you at least can see touch and somewhat control... which would you chose?
Forgot to mention one key term I do not see mentioned here.
Land banks bitchez.
Record low rates are good for the housing market, its just that housing prices would be a lot lower if rates were at 20% like where they should be. It looks like this may be just the ticket to clear the way for the Fed to purchase its $920B in MBS March 13.
TheSilverJournal.com
There's a glut of houses - So let's build more?
Yep - That will get the recovery going.
Why not just build whole new empty cities like China?
http://www.thedeathofamerica.org/images/shanghai-detroit.jpg
You are exectly right Moneyswirth. There are no more assests for the fed to blow into a gigantic bubble to make the middle class still feel rich.
there are so many things wrong with Bernanke's policies it's not possible to describe. Someone please hang him from a lamp post
If people had jobs, better than min wage, they could pay for a fucking house. They could also qualify to buy a new house. You can play funky monkey games all fucking day long with numbers and charts, as longs as the likes of Mcdonald's is in the spotlight as one of our nations biggest employers YOUR NOT GOING TO HAVE A HOUSING RECOVERY. Why is that so fkn hard to figure out?
The next greatest thing is investors buying up homes and renting them out for $1,000 a month. If people couldn't afford the mort payment then they can afford an equally high rent payment??? Sure.......if we have 4 families per house.
These people are idiots.
Since many other ZHers probably browse similar sites...I saw an article yesterday on the shadow residential real estate inventory in NY. It was an astounding number. Now I can't find the article (I thought I read it on ZH but apparently not), and I was hoping someone else had seen it and could help a blind squirrel.
The only way to stimulate the housing market is by encouraging new household formation and real demand to clear up the outstanding inventory. How about this: bring home 50 % of troops from overseas, let them secure the southern border and participate in public works via corps. of engineers. Bring home foreign embassy staff that can work via internet.. have them settle in Las Vegas or other city hardest hit.
Amnesty program for working immigrants with path to citizenship based on good behaviour and new household formation. Decriminalize drugs and stem the flow of money going south, let the local crop growers reap the profits and the states the taxes. Empty out the jails of victimless criminals and put them to work if need be on a salary somewhat less than the cost to the taxpayer of their previous incarceration. Lie back, light up and watch the free market work from bottom up.
We might also want to create a tax haven area in Florida (also hard hit by the housing thing) to encourage repatrriation of funds and retirees from the Caymans, Bermuda, Monaco Lichenstein etc. Stem the flow of retirees and their Social security funds to abroad (primarily Mexico).. incentivize them to retire in the Sun Belt. The expatriate thing is a growing problem for the US economy.
Truly stupid, agree. Oh, and what about stopping the banks from carrying homes at full price on their books?? How bout some good old mkt forces like a profit incentive to get the shit on the mkt instead of sitting around. They have no downside?? I would sit on it also and just wait, its free money anyway for the bank. Love to see that perk taken away.
You know what the economy needs now:normalization of rate policy.
If fed says in 12 months from now rates will be 1%, and 14 months they will be 1.5%. The whole country would fricking cheer.
At this point ZIRP is only stimulating the Treasury.
Ok, this is ridiculous .......sometime between now and Nov they have to let the market pull back somewhat........ Come on FED, let it be a little more natural.
Epic Fed Fail.
I'm picking a bottom: a house for 30 pieces of silver.
Well...no one is buying because they either defaulted on a mortgage, about to default, lost a job, believe prices will still be going down, and/or the banks won't lend. I believe when interest rates start going up, things will start moving....Oh, thats right...interest rates can't go up or the U.S. defaults on its debt...We need to flood the market with more dollars...that will jump start housing...not!
With massive government spending continuing apace it makes no sense to make any long term financial decisions like buying a house. It has begun, to pay for itself the government is already casting the stink eye upon anything of real value so it can be confiscated.
Bullshit property laws = bullshit housing market.
Garbage in, garbage out.
Residential housing still has another 40-65% to fall across the US (all of it, some places higher).
This is continually revised upward with the stripping of wages.
The Fed intentionally bailed out banks and sacrificed the middle class (where owning a home is a much bigger deal).
Fuck the Fed, end that unconstitutional abortion and the $600T crony-fraud finance vapor industry it supports.
Line up the suckers that think the Fed gives a fuck about anything BUT fraud banking cartels.
1. Lending standards are tighter, therefore, stupid people, who tend to engage in reckless behavior, cannot qualify for home loans.
2. People who can qualify for housing loans, due to responsible behavior and good credit ratings, aren't stupid enough to assume that they are going to have a stable income for the next 30 years. Therefore, they do not get home loans.
3. Housing prices are still far too high for America's 50 million Mexican immigrants to afford on their welfare + under the table cash earnings. Further, their reportable income disqualifies them even if their drug dealing, pimping, thieving, and cash only businesses do qualify them.
4. The Boomers, America's second largest generation ever, are still retiring and dying. The bulk of them are still holding onto property. Property that must be sold or passed onto their family, thus driving down prices and possibly preventing younger people from having a reason to buy property of their own.
5. Therefore, real estate prices in America have nowhere to go but down, for at least another 10-20 years. The demographics combined simply do not support rising real estate prices in the absence of "hyper" inflation (i.e. the trillions of conjured money makes it into the hands of the peasantry).
1. no they are not
2. try shorting the dollar another way
3. Mexican and other immigrants live 10 to a 2 bedroom they can afford it and do. China has a few bucks themselves so does the rest of the world
4. Boomers often have two homes I know many that are buying multiple locations right now
5. you have no idea what the demographics are going to be (immigration, longer life spans, etc)
Most of your responses are nonsensical. However, the fact that Boomer's are buying multiple homes is a reflection of:
1. They have ALL the money, the youth of America are impoverished
2. They will ALL be dead soon enough, and those multiple properties are going to be left to their descendants, thus reinforcing my original point #4
"most of your arguements are nonsensical" good arguement. You got me.
regarding your above points
1. No they are not impoverished. Especially the ones working for the federal government, facebook, google, apple, state governments, nike, banks, and on and on and on. Your broad brush view is skewed.
2. They will all be dead they are just starting to retire and the lifespan right now is 80 some years. Keep holding your breath for 20 years maybe longer.
Uh OH not from NAR but from actual listing closures
http://athomeinscottsdale.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/phoenix-real-estate-median-sales-price.jpg
Keep hanging on tight to those dollars while real assets appreciate. Sorry to tell you boomers are not going to be buying into gold and silver. That leaves few other options.
Big time thumbs up ATR. Says all anyone needs to know about this shit. For you that disagree, demographics and economics drive the markets. ANd BOOMERS are BROKE.....they are selling (or trying to), downsizing, NOT buying. Their medical bills from being FAT and doing drugs (legal and otherwise), disappearing pensions, and massive debts have finally caught up with them. Those with money aren't making any due to stock market losses (401k that were raped) and no interest on bonds. I know. I am related to a dozen of them. And they are almost all BROKE DICK. Or haven't you been reading recent articles about "boomers working until they drop"? There is no fixing bubble collapses.....only preventing them.
Time for a scandal at the NAR.....the US Govt/FED takes over housing numbers to be issued to us like everything else. Wait for the new and improved Olympic Manipulation of Everthing Housing Related. Enjoy the show. Kind of a double top secret stochastic ex-food-energy-and-reality-adjusted numbers.
damned robots!
...and here's what the headlines trumpet, followed by a reality check:
"WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. home resales surged in January to a 1-1/2 year high and the supply of properties on the market was the lowest in almost seven years, pointing to a nascent housing recovery.
The National Association of Realtors said on Wednesday existing home sales increased 4.3 percent to an annual rate of 4.57 million units last month, the highest since May 2010.
"Overall this is not such a bad number. It's reflective of a better jobs market, but the improvement is going to be in fits and starts," said Yelena Shulyatyeva, U.S. economist at BNP Paribas in New York.
However, the tenor of the report was weakened somewhat by a sharp downward revision to December's sales data to show only a 4.38 million-unit rate rather than the previously reported 4.61 million-unit pace.
That followed an annual revision of the seasonal factors for the series going back three years. Sales in December actually fell 0.5 pct from November, instead of the 5 percent increase reported last month."
......sales actually fell, rather than the 5% increase they had previously reported....so the NAR is where the retired BLS workers move to????
Look at Mortgage Bankers Association nunbers instead of NAR. The Fed can't iginite a housing rally.
http://confoundedinterest.wordpress.com/2012/02/22/existing-home-sales-r...
cant blame it on the weather , you lowlife scumbags
trying to make shit stick to a wall planning
In recent years, the rate of homes bought for cash has grown. Clients who are able to afford it enjoy not having to go through the hassle and expense of finding a loan. Furthermore, home sellers will often lower the cost of a home to have the safety and quick closure that comes with cash sales. Alternatively, young adults purchasing for the first time have found their offers overlooked for cash on the table. Buying homes with cash more common since it can be an attractive proposition for both the seller and the buyer.