Housing slow down

[Ima saver]

Is this housing slow down, mortgage crunch thing, hurting any of you??

[Ima saver]

My husband is a builder and I am afraid this will hurt us next year.

[jodi]

I see it hurting my brother already. I listed his house several months ago fro $109k. In last year's market, it should have sold quickly, probably for about $100k. It's a decent house in a nice village of newer houses that sell for $140k and up - it does need some work, but not a lot. It's move-in condition. Anyway, we've dropped the price several times and it's now sitting at $89k (I was told by other realtors at each price drop that "it won't sit long at that price"). But there it sits. It seems that every couple that comes through says that it is too much work (really, all it needs is new exterior paint and the floors of a few rooms to be refinished). People don't understand that to get a cheap house in this village, you have to expect that some work needs to be done. Buyers definitely are a lot pickier than they were a year ago because they can afford to be - there are so many more houses sitting idle on the market than a year or even six months ago.

My brother did everything right - he got a conventional, fixed rate mortgage, put a chunk of money down, made numerous improvements to the house...now he's a victim of bad timing.

[Caoineag]

Yes and no. Yes it hurts because my husband works in the mortgage industry and has weathered 4 layoffs already and may need to survive one more. No, because we are house hunting next fall and the downturn means more homes are within our reach. Its sort of a mixed blessing for us.

[sweeps]

I bought another house 18 months into the slowdown. So I got hurt a bit selling my old house, but I made it back and then some by getting a good deal on my new house. It does bug me a bit that the value of the house has gone down since I bought it, but I'm not moving for many years, so it's a non-issue really.

[Ima saver]

It doesn't just affect buyers, sellers and builders. It affects plumbers, electricans, mason people, carpet people, etc. etc.

[DebbieL]

Well, I just wish the current run up had never happened (to insane levels). I think we would have all been better off if the housing bubble hadn't existed. Where I live an average house (as of September's stats) was going for $584K. Five or six years ago it would have been $240K (still expensive IMO). I am totally screwed if this thing doesn't crash. I cannot even dream of buying at these stupid prices (although there seems to be no end to the suckers who will - with 100% financing no less). The average household (not individual) income in my city is in the 60K's. Houses are selling for 9-10 times the average household income??? Something's got to give.

[cptacek]

Originally Posted by jodi

It seems that every couple that comes through says that it is too much work (really, all it needs is new exterior paint and the floors of a few rooms to be refinished).

If this is all that needs to be done, why doesn't your brother do this? Couple of weekends, or a month or two of weekends, and he could get out from under this house.

[disneysteve]

I can't say that it has had any direct effect on me or my finances, other than via the stock market correction a few months ago, but that was long overdue anyway and the Dow has already recovered and hit a record high yesterday.

It did affect my mother when she sold her house earlier this year. She put it on the market in June 2006 and it took until March 2007 to sell, with the price reduced several times along the way. It ended up selling for about $40,000 less than it would have brought a year or so earlier.

[mom-from-missouri]

My house has been on the market 2 yrs now. I just keep renting it out. Real estate people from 4 different companies tell me I am priced correctly. A lot of the area where my house is at are Air Force people, so the war is having an effect on that area for real estate. Wives don't want to buy while husbands are deployed for maintance reasons per one of the realtors.

[Staceyy]

I'm a laid off mortgage banker.

[jodi]

Originally Posted by cptacek

If this is all that needs to be done, why doesn't your brother do this? Couple of weekends, or a month or two of weekends, and he could get out from under this house.

He doesn't have the time - he has been spending every spare minute getting his new house ready (new construction - he's done a lot of the work himself). Plus, he's already below what he thought he could sell it at and still make a tiny profit. Any money he puts in now (and it will cost several thousand to get the place decently painted) will be a loss. Although...he might just have to do it.

[Joan.of.the.Arch]

Here's one-- my brother's friend joins a roofing crew part time on weekends. But lately there has been no part time weekends. The owner of the company tells him that people are waffling on whether to get their roofs replaced! They are evidently trying to stretch out the life of the roof and pass it on to a new house buyer if possible, while new house buyers are also taking their chances with getting a little more life out of the roofs on their "new" homes. He didn't say if this delay was going on with people who do not intend to sell soon....Seems risky to me.

[jIM_Ohio]

Originally Posted by Ima saver

Is this housing slow down, mortgage crunch thing, hurting any of you??

My eyes hurt from reading posts about it.
My head hurts from listening to complaints about it.

JK.

My uncle installs plumbing in new construction... he is still employing his full staff (4 people) and working 6 days per week. He's in Buffalo, not the biggest of bubbles.

We bought in Dec of 05 and spent 350k+. The house across the street is a market house, finished in May of 06 and they asked for 325k. Slightly smaller version of same floor plan my wife and I chose. They are now asking less than 280k for same house.

So I am only affected if I sell. We plan to live in house for years, so no issue YET.

[DebbieL]

ANYTHING will sell if the price is right. After two years your house should have been long sold if it were priced correctly. It is not priced correctly for today’s market (which is the only market with any relevance if you want to sell – doesn’t matter what 2 years ago was). Obviously you are in no rush to sell and are okay with renting it out, but your realtor is feeding you a line if they tell you it is prices correctly. All the excuses in the world don’t change the market. Anything will sell with the right price (it may not be the price YOU think it’s worth, but the price the market thinks it’s worth which is all that matters).

[momof1in150]

Originally Posted by DebbieL

ANYTHING will sell if the price is right. After two years your house should have been long sold if it were priced correctly. It is not priced correctly for today’s market (which is the only market with any relevance if you want to sell – doesn’t matter what 2 years ago was). Obviously you are in no rush to sell and are okay with renting it out, but your realtor is feeding you a line if they tell you it is prices correctly. All the excuses in the world don’t change the market. Anything will sell with the right price (it may not be the price YOU think it’s worth, but the price the market thinks it’s worth which is all that matters).

The problem with the housing market is that most people trying to sell are upside down on their mortgage or have their house priced so they can get out of it. That is why the mortgage industry is tightening their lending terms. Too many people bought more house then they can afford and are now trying to sell them in a market that cannot support the price that they need to get out of their pricey mortgage.

[DebbieL]

The prices were artificially inflated during this housing bubble. I for one can't wait to see some sanity return to my local housing market. I won't consider buying unless things go to half what they are trying to ask now (which is more than double the prices in 2001). A normal housing market is what I want to see return. The easy money is over folks.

[Ima saver]

Yes, the easy money is over. I was paying $30,000 for view lots a few years ago, now everyone wants $100,000 and up for a view lot. I am sitting and waiting for prices to come down also.

[Ronin]

I use to be nearly impossible to buy a house in California, now hopefully this time next year I'll be able to afford a decent house and get out of these hell apartments

[ealimbuyao]

Is it time now to move to Sunny California? The only reason why I postponed relocating to California is the price of houses. With the housing slow down, do you think the salary ranges will slow down too? I mean, they are paying healthcare workers there a whole lot because of the high cost of living. Would they lower the salary with the lowering of real estate properties?