Housing Doom

Paul Sarbanes must have put something extra in the coffee. "Weeks not months" indeed. Just nine days after the Sept 20 Senate hearing "Calculated Risk: Assessing Non-Traditional Mortgage Products", the agencies have released their new guidance.[1]

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This is from the Appraisers of Las Vegas Website.  I need to use the Dave Barry disclaimer here- I am not making this up! 

The appraisers ask the question, Hey Lenders!  Why Do you need an Appraisal?  The answer:

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Have you found any respectable housing related links, Lereahisms, lyrics, limericks, enLightenment? 
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Las Vegas boasts the hottest housing market! was the title of an article yesterday from KVBC TV.  On the other hand, Las Vegas was also featured prominently in yesterday’s Bloomberg article:  Homebuilders Offer Garages, Sod to Lure Buyers Amid U.S. Housing Slump.  When you read the articles though, it appears that  "hottest" and "slump" seem to be synonymous.

From KVBC: 

In addition to being the casino capital of the United States, Las Vegas also boasts the hottest housing market. Home inventories continue to grow after more than a decade of red-hot activity - up 17-percent during the month of August.

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It is reasonable to assume that the housing market is going to be driven by the most motivated players.  Sellers are the ones that currently have the pressure on to blink first- and the one’s most likely to blink are sellers of vacant properties.  Curious then on how many sellers fall in this "extra motivated" catagory, I decided to keep tabs on the local  vacancy rate.  On August 5, Housingdoom’s favorite realtor gave us the vacancy rate and total listings for the Phoenix metro area. 

Total listings:  46,338
Total vacant:  20,414
% vacant:  44%

Now it’s 52 days later, and I was wondering where the Phoenix market currently stands.  (There would have been a logic to checking at 60 days- but I didn’t want to wait.)  So we asked again, and here are the current numbers (as of yesterday morning):
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On September 20, the US Senate held a very important hearing titled "Calculated Risk: Assessing Non-Traditional Mortgage Products".  I’ve started writing a guide to the resources on the hearing site.  It’s located in the Doom "Pages" list, upper right of our home page.  Look for Study Guide: Senate 20Sep06 Exotic Mortgages Hearing.

The intention is to provide a resource with links to key news reports and resources, and a guide to the three hour long audio transcript. There is a tremendous amount of good stuff packed in the hearing site, and much of it may prove to be of enduring value. This is still a preliminary version of the project with construction cranes swinging around. Put on your hard-hats and come on in if you dare.

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DON’T TRY THIS AT HOME!  Professional driver on closed course!

 Wait a minute, we’re talking about selling a home, not racing a car, but you would think from some of the warnings you hear that you were involved in a similarly dangerous activity.  Realtors have been warning folks for years that FSBO isn’t something you want to do on your own.  Here’s a couple of examples:
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Exotic, or toxic mortgages have been under fire recently.  It has become apparent that the mortgages that helped people get into a rising market, are causing a lot of pain in a declining one.  What is not getting a lot of press is the "toxic lease-option."  Lease-options can be useful in certain instances, but can be harmful to the uneducated tenant.
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On Thursday, Nadia Chernyak wrote a sensitive story [1] for The Cornell (University) Daily Sun. I’m presuming she is a student herself or someone in touch with that generation. The piece goes beyond the chronic housing problems for the many students in Ithaca NY to look at affordability issues for ordinary folk in the region. It notes that the underlying problem will take years to work out. I believe it will be people like Ms Chernyak who will ultimately dig us out of the problems arising from the burst of the housing bubble. Below I’m reproducing my response to her article.

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John and I love hearing from Housingdoom readers- we learn a lot from your insights.  Today we thought we would share several recent emails we received from around the country- they have all rated their own posts today.  We hope you’ll keep sending us your observations, links, and research.  In addition to the three posts, this is an open thread for Housingdoomers to have their say today.
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