June 23, 2008
Lynnsy Logue The Real Estate Lady® and Condo CanDo® in Charlotte, NC
The Sharp Housing Downturn Continues to Pressure the Economy
Harvard Releases the 2008 State of the Nation’s Housing Report
If you are interested in an excellent overview, I have included a link to this report. Harvard also makes it available in a .pdf format. I will quote a snippet...
"Until the number of vacant for-sale units on the market ... falls enough to bring vacancy rates back down, house prices will remain under pressure," the report said. "Working off the oversupply will require some combination of the following: housing starts fall even further, prices decline enough to bring out new bargain-seeking buyers, interest rates drop enough to improve affordability, job growth improves, consumer confidence returns, and mortgage credit again becomes more widely available."
Single-family home prices in the first quarter of 2008 were down 12 percent from their October 2005 peak -- 18 percent in real terms, after adjusting for inflation. A "dispiriting picture" of housing affordability issues nevertheless remains.
The report, "The State of the Nation's Housing 2008," is more optimistic about medium- to long-term prospects, estimating that unless there's a serious, prolonged economic decline or a marked cutback in immigration, the nation will gain 14.4 million new households between 2010 and 2020, compared with 12.6 million between 1995 and 2005.
http://www.jchs.harvard.edu/media/son_release_2008.html
Lynnsy Logue The Real Estate Lady® and Condo CanDo® in Charlotte, NC
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