It’s time once again to expand on our preview of foreclosure activity with a more detailed look at September’s stats in King, Snohomish, and Pierce counties. First up, the Notice of Trustee Sale summary: September 2011 King: 499 NTS, down 62% YOY Snohomish: 259 NTS, down 59% YOY Pierce: 317 NTS, down 56% YOY Foreclosure…
Reader Story: Renting Gave me the Freedom to Buy Today
I received the following in an email from a reader: I’m writing to thank you for your tireless work keeping my wife and I informed and entertained about the Seattle housing market. I specifically remember asking my real-estate agent friend in 2007 if she thought there were legitimate concerns about the housing market and her…
Running the Numbers on the Flat Homeowner Deduction
[Read Part 1: Proposal: Replace the Mortgage Interest Deduction with a Flat Homeowner Deduction] In the comments on the proposal I made yesterday, Doug asked a reasonable question: Have you figured out what the deduction would be if you did this, and made it deficit neutral? That would be an interesting exercise. Good question. Let’s…
Proposal: Replace the Mortgage Interest Deduction with a Flat Homeowner Deduction
In our discussion on Sunday’s poll about whether government policy should be steering people into homebuying, I had an interesting idea that I thought was worth sharing with the whole class. The Problem There are numerous problems with the methods the government has used and is using to promote homebuying. One-time homebuyer tax credits just…
September Stats Preview: Better Late than Never Edition
All righty, it may be ten days into Ocotober already, but that’s not going to stop me from posting our regular stats “preview,” because I just like to see the data presented in the simple bar chart format of this series. Most of the charts below are based on broad county-wide data that is available…