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I have a friend that sounds just like these people – husband keeps trying and failing to start a business, new truck, refi and spend.

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I really want to attend but will not be able to make it. 🙁

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There are three houses for sale on my small street. Two of the houses have been for sale for over a year and one house just came up for sale that sold only a year ago. It was purchased as a vacation home and the guy bought a lot of expensive water toys. I wonder why he is selling?

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Up in arms, just make sure you invest in granite countertops for your properties. 😉

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I think most people would choose getting info over the internet – no hassle, it is free, no sales pitch, you get updates at midnight and it doesn’t pester you with call-backs.

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I have only noticed the smell once or twice and I live right on the water. There is some garbage on the beach but I would not say it is bad.
As for houses for sale, I drove around a little bit yesterday and saw a lot of signs. However, most of the houses in the low end are priced about $200,000 more than last year. I went into a tiny 2/1 with a small patio yard and 1 car garage that was priced at 1.2M. It would have been priced at about $800,000 – $900,000 last year. I see a lot of houses that are priced way above comps. People are reaching for the moon. I have even seen some houses and lots that are priced DOUBLE what they should be priced.

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I think zillow is an excellent tool for the average person. The estimate is usually off but it enables people to see comps in the neighborhood and do their own estimate. If you know the neighborhood and understand which houses have premiums, you can come pretty close to figuring out what the house is worth. I say hurray! for sites like zillow which empower the average person and take the information monopoly away from realtors.

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I also overheard a conversation yesterday. A young woman was talking to another about the fact that she just graduated from college (maybe grad school?). She was saying that she and her husband were going to move to Michigan as they can’t afford to buy a house here and she wants to own. She did not sound too happy.

Just another slice of the forced outmigration!

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The article said, “One out of three Americans fear that rising monthly payments — especially property taxes and energy costs — will force them to sell their home and buy a less expensive one, according to a survey to be released today by the National Association of Realtors.”

One out of three is quite a lot. When their home value starts to decline, what will that do to their fear?

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I would not say that realtors and appraisers preyed on people. As for the the appraisers, they are just reporting the current market value of the house. Listing realtors are trying to get the most for their client and buyer’s agents are (hopefully) trying to get the best deal. The market is set by the buyers. It is the buyers, as a group of sheeple, who are responsible. Everyone else is along for the ride. Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of shady realtors who spout all kinds of rosy nonsense to stupid buyers who believe it. To say that realtors and appraisers preyed on people suggests that they KNEW prices were not supportable. I would say most of them thought that prices would actually go up forever as they are no smarter than the average buyer (plus, they actually believe NAR).

I do think that lenders have failed in their responsibility to the buyers in the last few years. Most people do not really understand the complexities of their loans. They simply do not understand the financial ramifications of their loan outside of how much it will cost each month (and sometimes even that they don’t understand because of ARMs and IO). Fees are often hard to determine, even for people who understand finance. So you end up with too many people in dangerous loans and who do not even understand the perilousness of their position.

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There is a small area between Imperial Beach and the freeway where every house has bars on the windows and every available parking space is filled. The driveways overflow with vehicles and they line the streets. I have never seen so many cars in a residential neighborhood before. The houses are all 3/2 or 4/2 dumps from the early 80s and they are selling for about 500k.

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I don’t think there is much chance of finding something in SD that pencils out right now.

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Thanks for posting that site!

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“Smart Buyers Agents will shore up decling price increases by asking SELLER’s of Vacant60 homes to do carry back notes against some of the owners ‘Fear Equity'”

I don’t understand what you are saying here.

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Thank you for your responses.

Are any of your clients expressing concern over the market reversing?
If you believed that the market was going down, would you have a fiduciary duty to tell your clients?

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