- Decent tips for renters: "10 Things Your Landlord Won't Tell You" http://bit.ly/hSWebS via @SmartMoney #
- I'd say all the time, if they're being artificially limited. "Sometimes, fewer foreclosures are bad for business" http://bit.ly/fjxxGZ #
- Funky: Futuristic, low-priced homes with a past finally go on sale http://bit.ly/fwofzq via @SeattleTimes #
- Anything is better than the disgusting townhomes vomited across the cityscape during the bubble. RT @realestatepi: http://bit.ly/fuKWOr #
- Great bailout viz: http://bailout.propublica.org/list $554b disbursed, $221b returned. #
- Lots of foreign buyers in Seattle's housing market? http://bit.ly/f1lQ5S Heard it before. http://on.msnbc.com/gmQCeL #
- via @PSBJ – "Frontier Bank had a $450 million rescue plan but regulators rejected the deal" http://bit.ly/gwSztJ by @KirstenGrind #
- Zillow launches agent reviews. http://bit.ly/i2NBXp What an original, fresh concept! ;^) http://bit.ly/hCYZvD #
- Wow, Washington is only slightly behind California in public debt per capita. http://bit.ly/hAXQiy WA: $2,226 | CA: $2,362 #
- When we've still got "I've always been handy" type people looking to flip homes, I don't think we're at the bottom. http://bit.ly/ebWUx8 #
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On the California per capita debt, that will likely change soon. Google “train to nowhere” for the latest on how they’re spending $4B to build a high speed train between two small towns.
There are some ugly townhouses built in Edmonds during the bubble–so close to each other that you can reach out your living room or bedroom window and shake hands with your neighbor who’s also in his “home.”
This company is advertising new homes for $179,000 with 2.5% financing and $693 monthly payments.
http://polygon.localplacement.net/polygon/communities/ThisSeries.aspx?Community=TheRidgeatSuncrest42&Series=SingleFamilyHomes57&Floorplan=194
http://polygon.localplacement.net/polygon/Uploads/PNW_Ridge.pdf
Please, all you Real Estate Brainiacs — tell me what the catch is?
RE: Sparsecus @ 3 – Not familiar with the project, but one thing that has allowed new house prices to drop considerably is that it’s possible to pick up vacant lots a lot cheaper now than before. I’m not terribly familiar with that market, but I’ve heard of lots that use to cost over $100k being available for under $20k.
That inventory of fully and partially developed lots will be restraining the market for quite some time in some areas. Imagine if you had bought a 2007 built PoS home on a 3800 square foot lot that cost the developer $100,000. You’d be in trouble if there are a lot of other lots in the area that size still not built on. Your main hope would be that a developer would change the lot sizes to something bigger that didn’t compete with your property.
RE: Kary L. Krismer @ 4 – To add to this comment, the owners of sub-dividable lots probably made out with more profit than anyone else locally during 2005-2007. Here the focus is on greedy sellers, real estate agents and mortgage brokers, etc., but those people who owned raw land were the ones making a killing.
On the foreigners buying in Seattle….only from BC.
Overseas, Seattle has no cache. At cocktail parties, you want to say you have a home in L.A., Miami, San Francisco, or NY. The rest of the US does not exist, period.
Why spent $300K in Seattle, when you can get a condo by the water for $150 in South FL?
RE: Cheap South @ 6 – I would guess a lot of that is price driven, with the exception of NY and to some extent San Fran.
I have been reading in different places, including this blog, the attached “Decent tips for renters”, etc., that rents are now shooting up rapidly and suggesting that renters should buy now to avoid throwing away money on rent. Yet I am not seeing that at all in reality. My one year lease expired in October and my landlord has not been in a rush to increase my rent. And with good reason, since when I look through Craigslist I see ever greater numbers of rental houses coming on the market at prices lower than my current rent. If he raises my rent I will move. And if he doesn’t lower it, I may move anyway, depending on what I find available and to some extent, the aggravation factor involved in moving.
As for the poster that stated that the Fed is soon going to come up with a scheme that will stop the slide in real estate prices forever, I don’t believe it. Even if I could, I will not buy a house that I cannot afford, and the majority of people in the country now know they also can’t do this. What is the Fed going to do, throw us in jail for not buying your grotesquely overpriced shack ? Are they going to make it illegal to not participate in the ponzi economy ?