It’s amusing to read the prognosticators repeating the industry party line of a San Diego real estate market bottom and to buy now before one misses this great opportunity. Are the ‘talking heads’ just overly optimistic, espousing on unfounded hope, lies, or just ignorance?
The key to long-term house prices was, and will remain, incomes. Long-term, buyers can afford about three times income, assuming they don’t have too much other debt. Discussions on how much prices have dropped (Gee, it’s down 50% so that MUST mean it won’t fall any more!) are not of great interest if that’s all there is to the discussion.
Unemployment continues to collapse (-250k jobs is horrid, though merely less horrid than -600k jobs). Lending is tight. Consumers are still heavily in debt.
Let’s assume we get growth in 2012. Will the Fed start raising interest rates by then? Probably. If the deflationary forces of contracting credit abate and the inflationary forces of printing start to take hold, we could see rates rise sharply from 2012 to 2020. What will happen to house prices with mortgage rates at ten to twelve percent??
The issue at the core of the recovery is how long it will take to get the number of qualified buyers back. We have lost many homebuyers. All the people in foreclosure can’t buy for at least 3 years because of bank guidelines. Then they will have to save the money too. Plus we have taken some investors out of the market. At what point will new home buyers equal the old foreclosed people is the answer to when the market will come back. My guess is 3 to 5 years.
San Diego real estate agents
With the dollar strengthening, I see this as a good sign. It may help interest rates to subside a bit. BUT, we have so far to go to get back to anything like a normal market.
San Diego lawyers