With regard to Twist’s cartography skills, somebody should get Landiscor or whoever (I don’t think Zillow or the Repugnant would take the job) to do a Valley misery index (i.e. assessed value – which I admit is not expected to be in the ballpark of liquidation value – divided by median income by zipcode), and, perhaps with some kind of wonky finance overlay, SEE where the most pain is.

Just a thought.

About bullet-proof Scottsdale….

L graciously looked up the Scottsdale numbers for me:

There are 1351 properties listed in Scottsdale for over $1M. 482 have sold since 1/01/07- around 81/month. So there is probably around a 16 month supply- way worse than the Valley average of almost 10 months.

I’m a big believer in old-fashioned supply and demand- there aren’t enough millionaires to buy all these properties. Prices are going to come down.

And for those who suffer from Scottsdale hate/envy, L also sent me a blog I hadn’t seen before.

Thanks L!

You obviously haven’t seen my cartographic skills- I can draw a map that will get you from my house to the market though! : )

Everyone that I know who is selling a home is worried. They are worried that no one is coming to look, let alone make an offer. We have a guy on the job here that has had his “median” priced home on the market for over a year…

When a reliable third party starts compiling and analyzing the data… I’ll start to pay attention to it. Until then I don’t trust anything the NAR or Gobberment has to say about “statistics”. If they reported the truth we would have a totally different outlook on the market because the prices would have already fell by more than 65%.

Check these blogs out and be sure to comment in a nice way:

http://barbaralasky.com/tucson-real-estate-blog/

http://www.tucsonrealestateblogs.com/

If we’re doing community or zip code maps, i’d also like to see a map of conventional vs. wonky financing (i.e. percent conventional vs. all or something like that, and not just by state. The guys that did the country map got their figures somewhere.

Disclaimer: I don’t live in north ‘dale.

Kid — Lest ye stone me in writing, I would suggest to all that there are some places in the country that ARE more bulletproof than others, north ‘dale being one, simply because incomes don’t matter as much as bank accounts there. Until MLB and NFL salaries, PGA purses, and the prices of weed/X/meth on college campuses drop, values at Whisper Rock or other developments of that ilk are not going down much. Likewise for Beverly Hills, La Jolla, Point Loma, etc. The chicks still will pay for upgraded bojobs and botox, ergo, the doctors will pay an un-market price for RE in the most desirable neighborhoods. So…if north ‘dale prices are off the charts, its because the common man doesn’t live there. Which is not to say they can’t go down, but I think it’s more likely that, say, $700k TW Lewis homes in Estrella will decline than the $4MM Whisper Rock custom places will.

That to me is why a price/income map is crucial, particularly in terms of the incomes.

That would have to be a number over 80%, wouldn’t it?…
Get the MSM to chew on that!

That is of course wrong, because it completely leaves out the % chance of stagnant prices. And stagnant prices can be just as bad as falling prices, due to inflation, property taxes, property upkeep fees, etc.

If there is a 65% chance of falling prices, then what are the chances of falling OR stagnant prices?

Assuming *THAT* stat is 80% or more (ie: 15% chance of stagnant prices + 65% chance of falling prices), then at least 4 out of ever 5 people buying homes today are going to in fact lose out in the next two years.

If 65% chances of falling prices ain’t waking up the MSM, maybe 80% chances of falling/stagnant prices will.

conventional wisdom is that area is bulletproof, to which i say- complete balderdash. the ratio there is as out-of-whack as any in the country.

Havens-of-Manhattan.com

YAWN. i couldn’t care less what the “official” statistics say or what Jay Butler says, prices have dropped already and are dropping as we speak.

there is every reason to believe prices will continue to drop meaningfully until the economic fundamentals become far more rational than they are currently.

My plans to dominate Mohave County RE are not subject to downside risk. Score!

It also looks remarkably like this wonky loan map.  Coincidence?  I think not!

the map is closely tied to the heat map of overvaluations…. almost like twins

http://immobilienblasen.blogspot.com/2007/05/interactive-heatmap-housing-overunder.html