Rather than editorializing on everything I heard at the Pacific Northwest Housing Summit today, I thought you all might just enjoy some unfiltered quotes from the industry professionals.
Bret Bertolin
Senior Analyst, Washington State Economic and Revenue Forecast Council
On the broad economy…
We believe that the economy has turned the corner, and it pick up steam by mid-year.
On the savings rate…
You might think it’s a virtue to save more… we look at it the other way when we’re in this kind of a situation. High savings slows growth.
On unemployment…
The unemployment rate is still very high… We expect the peak unemployment rate to be in the first or second quarter this year, so we’re almost there.
On home prices…
We’re not convinced that this actually is the bottom, either for the US, or for Seattle, or the state.
Bret presented a number of charts and graphs, which he said he would post on their website sometime in the next week or so.
Ken Reid
Account Manager, Genworth Mortgage Insurance
On home sales volumes…
Home sales are rising a bit… The question is, can you sustain this? And I don’t know that we have the answer.
On fog-a-mirror lending…
We have learned our lesson.
Marc Savitt
President, National Association of Independent Housing Professionals
On the Home Valuation Code of Conduct (HVCC)…
What this is doing is destroying the entire housing industry. The housing industry represents about 16% of the overall economy. It’s causing job failures, business loss, and most importantly, it’s causing the erosion of equity in everybody’s home in this country, just like a foreclosure does.
Stan Sidor
Chairman, Appraisal Coalition of Washington
On bank-owned inventory growing on the market…
I still see that this year at least, I don’t see the end of that cycle and that trend. It will be interesting to continue to watch it through the year and into next year and see what happens.
Spencer Rascoff
Chief Operating Officer, Zillow
On Seattle-area home values…
Zillow’s data says that we think we will probably bottom in terms of Seattle-area home values this summer. Then we expect a relatively long period of pretty much flat real appreciation… Three to five years of home values kinda kicking along, plus-minus one percent, two percent.
Spencer actually had two slide presentations packed with data that he has already uploaded to his blog. It’s definitely worth taking a few minutes to check those out.
Ohan Antebian
Vice President of Industry Relations, REALTORS Property Resource™
REALTORS Property Resource™ is an online property portal developed by the National Association of REALTORS® for REALTORS® only. Ohan gave us a sneak peek demo, and it actually looked really sharp. Too bad it won’t be available to consumers.
Speaking on the NAR’s motivation for developing the software, Ohan had this to say…
At the end of the day, the world operates on incentives, not morality.
J. Lennox Scott
Chairman & CEO, John L. Scott Real Estate
I saved the best for last.
On the $8,000 first-time homebuyer tax credit…
The tax credit worked… We had a surge and then an unsurge of sales. We brought buyers forward by a couple months.
On sales volumes…
Sales are at a strong activity level at this time.* Every single month going forward, and we will see that continue.
Where the market currently sits on his personal sales volume scale…
90s is frenzy, 80 is strong, 70 is healthy, 60s are adjusting, 50s is major adjustment, 40s is major correction. … Now we’re back up to the 70-80 range. Strong market is what’s taking place.*
On current market conditions…
Right now today, all the indicators are back in alignment. The affordability index is back to a high.* We have the debt service to household income ratio back in alignment… These are two key indicators that I take a look at for historical norms.
On the “echo boom generation” entering the housing market…
We flat-out don’t have enough housing in the more affordable price ranges… I believe they’ll save the US economy in about five years, there’s so many of them.
On the relationship between home prices and incomes…
Prices historically have always gone up in direct proportion to household income. We got out of whack during the sub-prime era, with low interest rates, and the appreciation rate skyrocketed. So that was an anomaly. It has now come back down. It’s back into historical alignment,* and that’s what the appreciation will be as we get going down the road. It will be in direct proportion to increasing household income, on average. That’s what it does.
And although the prospects still look dim for Seattle Bubble getting a personal interview with Mr. Scott, he was at least a good sport for the camera:
Caption contest in the comments.