Alan, Alan, Alan…. you never learn.
That’s what I thought this morning when I read Alan Greenspan has called out another prospective bottom in the housing market.
“Home prices in the U.S. are likely to start to stabilize or touch bottom sometime in the first half of 2009,” he told the Wall Street Journal.
And while it wasn’t as awful as his Oct. 2006 call when he said the “worst may well be over” for the U.S. housing industry, it was pretty close. In fact, I’m a going to go on record and say that 2009 will make 2008 look very attractive by comparison.
So hold on to your glasses Al, the real “Age of Turbulence” is far from over. And try as you might, you will never be able to rewrite the history on this one.
Meanwhile, the bubble you created continues to collapse.
From RealtyTrac Staff entitled: Foreclosure Activity Increases 8% in July
“RealtyTrac, the leading online marketplace for foreclosure properties, today released its July 2008 U.S. Foreclosure Market ReportTM, which shows foreclosure filings – default notices, auction sale notices and bank repossessions – were reported on 272,171 U.S. properties during the month, an 8 percent increase from the previous month and a 55 percent increase from July 2007. The report also shows one in every 464 U.S. households received a foreclosure filing during the month.
“Bank repossessions, or REOs, continued to be the fastest growing segment of foreclosure activity in July, posting a 184 percent year-over-year increase – compared to a 53 percent year-over-year increase in default notices and an 11 percent year-over-year increase in auction notices,” said James J. Saccacio, chief executive officer of RealtyTrac. “The sharp rise in REOs, combined with slow sales, has resulted in a bloated inventory of bank-owned properties for sale.”
The Cape Coral-Fort Myers, Fla., metro area registered the highest foreclosure rate among the 230 metro areas tracked in the July report. One in every 64 households in the metro area received a foreclosure filing during the month – more than seven times the national average.
Three California cities followed in the metro foreclosure rate rankings: Merced was at No. 2 with one in every 73 households receiving a foreclosure filing; and Stockton and Modesto were in a virtual tie, each with one in every 82 households receiving a foreclosure filing.
With one in every 85 households receiving a foreclosure filing, the Las Vegas metro area’s foreclosure rate ranked No. 5, followed by three more California metros: Riverside-San Bernardino, Bakersfield and Vallejo-Fairfield.
Fort Lauderdale, Fla., documented the ninth highest metro foreclosure rate, and the foreclosure rate in Phoenix took the No. 10 spot.”
So where are you in the foreclosure morass? Here’s the current foreclosure map from RealtyTrac. It’s getting redder every month.
By the way, according to a new report from the National Association of Realtors (NAR), the nationwide median existing single family home price plunged 7.6% to $206,500 in the second quarter, down from $223,500 in the same period of 2007.
You missed again Alan. Now go away.
