Tuesday, August 28, 2007

My Own House Is Now Worth Approximately $3.........


U.S. homeowners, buyers and sellers have officially endured an entire year of falling home prices. The median American home cost $228,900 in July, down 0.6% from the month before… the 12th consecutive month of tumbling home prices.
All told, home prices fell 3.2% across the country in second quarter -- the steepest rate since the S&P started its Home Price Index in 1987.
"The pullback in the U.S. residential real estate market is showing no signs of slowing down," writes Robert Schiller, one of the architects of the S&P Home Price Index.
"The year-over-year decline reported in the second quarter of 2007 for the National Home Price Index is the lowest point in its reported history. On a regional level, 17 of 20 metro areas are showing declines in their annual growth rate from what was reported in May."
We remember talking to radio hosts and listeners in 2005-2006 after our book Empire of Debt came out. We warned at the time that housing and real estate “don’t always go up.” At that time, even that subtle rebuke was met with utter disdain. What happens now, when it looks like we were right?

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