Seatle-relo, you are not alone. I know many people who bought recently, some of whom had even heard the bad news. A friend of mine bought in VA last summer. I begged her not to buy until she had lived in the area, had a good feel for where they really wanted to live and had done a bunch of reasearch on the local market. I warned her that her realtor was full of s**t about claims that her house would appreciate 10% the first year and that there was a good chance that her house would depreciate. “But it is such a good deal,” she said. I shut up after they closed.
No one likes to admit that they made a mistake but she has said that she wishes she waited, the commute is bad and they would not have bought there if they had known the place better. She has made no mention of how much the value of her house has dropped but the truth looms large in our conversations. She is pretty bummed. She has said to me a number of times that “God must have had a plan for us to buy this house.” Hey, if she wants to believe that God has a plan for her to walk down a path to financial destruction, so be it.
