Category: US Housing
The analysis published under this category are as follows.Wednesday, September 01, 2010
U.S. Housing Sales Slump Whilst China's Boom / Housing-Market / US Housing
I’m back in Montana for a short visit and I am really enjoying my time here.
I’ve hiked around two of my very favorite spots in the world, Jewell Basin area of the Flathead National Forest and Glacier National Park, and even picked a couple buckets of wild huckleberries. Fortunately, I did not run into any grizzly bears, but I didn’t see Huckleberry Hound either.
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Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Little Hope for the U.S. Housing Market / Housing-Market / US Housing
Jon D. Markman writes: Just when you thought the housing market couldn't get worse, it did.
New single-family home sales slumped 12.4% in July to a record-low annual rate of 276,000 units, as homebuyers shunned their realtors in the absence of government support. The consensus expectation was for a slight up-tick to a 333,000 unit annual rate, so I suppose it's time to throw out the models. Sales over the prior three months were also revised lower by 9,000 units.
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Sunday, August 29, 2010
U.S. Home Sales Drop 27% In July And Things Are Only Going To Get Worse / Housing-Market / US Housing
On Tuesday the National Association of Realtors announced that existing home sales in the United States dropped a whopping 27.2% in the month of July. The consensus among analysts was that we would see a drop of around 13 percent, so when the 27 percent figure was announced it sent a shock through world financial markets.
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Friday, August 27, 2010
Why Are U.S. Home Sales Plummeting? Huge Waves of Foreclosures Coming down the Pike / Housing-Market / US Housing
The government opted to try to prop up prices. Indeed, as I have repeatedly pointed out, the government's entire strategy has been to try to artificially prop up the prices of all types of assets.
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Friday, August 27, 2010
U.S. New Home Sales Housing Market Forecast 2010 to 2020 / Housing-Market / US Housing
A bubble is like if you have a flat pond, and you throw a pebble in.
First there is an “up” wave; that you can ride (if you are smart or lucky); then there is a “down” wave, and the size and the shape of the down that follows the up is predicated by the size and the shape of the preceding up.
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Friday, August 27, 2010
Record Drop in U.S. Home Sales / Housing-Market / US Housing
Sales of existing US homes in July plunged by a record 27.2 percent from the previous month, according to a report released Tuesday by the National Association of Realtors.
The virtual collapse in home sales affected every region of the country and was more than twice as bad as anticipated by economic analysts, who had forecast a drop of 12.1 percent. Sales fell to 3.83 million units, compared to June’s downwardly revised figure of 5.26 million.
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Thursday, August 26, 2010
Moribund U.S. Housing Market Threatens to Kill Economic Recovery / Housing-Market / US Housing
Don Miller writes: The weak housing market, which has traditionally led the U.S. economy out of recent recessions, this time may put an end to the economic recovery.
Existing home sales plummeted by a record 27% to their lowest level in 15 years in July and inventories soared, the National Association of Realtors (NAR) reported yesterday (Tuesday). Home re-sales, which account for 90% of the total market, dropped to an annual rate of 3.83 million in July. And inventories rose to 12.5 months from 8.9 months in June, putting them at their highest level in more than a decade.
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Wednesday, August 25, 2010
U.S. Housing Market Holocaust, Existing Home Sales Crash / Housing-Market / US Housing
Don't look now, but someone just pushed the housing market off a cliff. The National Association of Realtors announced on Tuesday that the sales of existing homes fell a staggering 27.2 percent to a seasonably adjusted rate of 3.83 million units. This is the lowest number of sales since 1995. The reaction on Wall Street has been swift, shares plunged in a wild sell-off that pushed stocks down more than 100 points in a matter of minutes. US Treasuries rallied on the news sending bond yields lower as jittery investors sought safety from the ongoing avalanche of dismal economic data. The 10-year slid to 2.49% while the 2 year note dipped to 0.46%. Bond yields are a gauge of investor pessimism. At present, confidence in the management of the economy is at its nadir.
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Tuesday, August 24, 2010
U.S. Existing Home Sales Crash 27%, Treasury Bond Yields Hit New Lows / Housing-Market / US Housing
In yet another clean sweep, the third in a week or so, sales of existing homes dropped twice as much as expected, worse than every economist forecast, to a 15 year low. Inventory soared to 12.5 month, the highest since 1999. Treasury yields plunged with yield on the 10-year note falling as low as 2.50 and the 2-year note hitting a new all-time low at .47%.
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Monday, August 23, 2010
Let the U.S. Housing Market Normalize! / Housing-Market / US Housing
Recently there have been some encouraging signs that Congress is finally willing to admit what should have been evident two years ago. Even after a $150 billion bailout, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are still bankrupt and should be abolished. Indeed Rep. Barney Frank, a longtime champion of Fannie and Freddie has made a few statements alluding to this and I have signed on to a letter asking him to clarify his remarks and hold hearings on this topic. There seems to be a growing consensus in favor of abolishing Fannie and Freddie. This is the good news.
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Tuesday, August 17, 2010
A Permanent U.S. Housing Market Collapse? / Housing-Market / US Housing
The recent chaos that erupted when 30,000 people waited hours in the Atlanta, Georgia heat to receive applications for subsidized housing is a mere symptom of a worsening national problem.
The housing market appears to be on a never-ending downward spiral, with the much-discussed "recovery" always around the next corner.
Sunday, August 15, 2010
U.S. Housing 10% Below Fundamentals, BubbleOmics Says Must Drop 15% More / Housing-Market / US Housing
From Felix Salmon today: The government does need to get the housing market going, because the alternative is unthinkable: if the government just kicked away the housing market’s multi-trillion-dollar scaffolding overnight, as Santelli suggests it should, then the entire banking system would become insolvent, and we’d soon be reminiscing wistfully about how painless and shallow the 2008 financial crisis was, compared to the one of 2011. http://seekingalpha.com/..
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Tuesday, August 10, 2010
The Forgotten U.S. Housing Market Foreclosure Crisis / Housing-Market / US Housing
Faiz Shakir writes: The economic meltdown of 2008 grew out of a foreclosure crisis, as Wall Street banks drove lenders to make loans that were then securitized and sold around the world, in an unregulated slew of credit products. This inflated a housing bubble that, when it burst, severely damaged an already weak economy, sent millions of homeowners into foreclosure, and put millions more out of work, leading to even more foreclosures as unemployed workers began to miss mortgage payments.
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Thursday, August 05, 2010
IMF Warns U.S. Real Estate Sectors Could Bring Banking Crisis 2.0 / Housing-Market / US Housing
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) stress tested 53 large banking holding companies and published its findings last month. The report concluded that despite restoration of some stability, there remain certain important risks to the U.S. financial system and economy mainly coming from the real estate sectors:
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Tuesday, August 03, 2010
Florida's Panhandle: Supreme Real Estate Buying Opportunity / Housing-Market / US Housing
Dr. Steve Sjuggerud writes: Greetings from Destin, Florida... Ground Zero for the Double Whammy.
I'm talking about the one-two punch of:
- The bust in Florida coastal real estate prices...
- AND the bust in tourism from the BP oil disaster in the Gulf.
Monday, August 02, 2010
Self Sustaining U.S. Housing Market Recovery? / Housing-Market / US Housing
John Paulson Will Be Wrong This Time - We have arrived at critical juncture in the ongoing financial crisis. Have the government actions of the last year successfully spurred the animal spirits of Americans, resulting in a self-sustaining recovery?The Obama administration and most of the mainstream media would answer yes. GDP has been positive for the last four quarters. Consumer spending has increased in five consecutive months. Corporate profits have been relatively strong. The country has stopped losing jobs. The missing piece has been a housing recovery.
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Tuesday, July 27, 2010
A Decade of Falling House Prices / Housing-Market / US Housing
The housing depression will last for a decade or more. This is by design. The Fed has been working with the banks to withhold inventory so prices do not fall too fast or too far. That way the banks can manage their write-downs without slipping into insolvency. But what's good for the banks is bad for the country. Capital impairment at the banks, means no credit expansion in the near-term. It means the economy will continue to contract, unemployment will remain high, and deflation will push down wages and prices. Everyone will pay for the mortgage-backed securities scam that was engineered by the banks.
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Monday, July 26, 2010
U.S. Housing Market is Stalling, REITs Are Dangerous Investments Right Now / Housing-Market / US Housing
Tom Dyson writes: "The housing market... is stalling again," says the Wall Street Journal this week.
On one hand, demand has evaporated. The government was giving out $8,000 tax credits for buying a new house. On April 30, the program ended. Naturally, anyone who wanted a house bought one before April 30. Now, there aren't any buyers.
Friday, July 23, 2010
U.S. House Price Forecast 2010 to 2015 / Housing-Market / US Housing
This is the first model I ever did for a bubble popping:
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Thursday, July 22, 2010
U.S. Taxpayers $3.7 Trillion Bailout Fails to Save Housing Market / Housing-Market / US Housing
Kerri Shannon writes: The amount of taxpayer dollars directed at the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) continues to grow but with little economic progress being made, particularly in the housing market.
Total taxpayer support for the mortgage market rose by $700 billion in the past year to $3.7 trillion, Neil Barofsky, the Special Inspector General for TARP, said his quarterly report to Congress.
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