it's over

So whats the next move by government/banks? They surely cant let this shadow inventory come to market. So what do they do now that the trial mods are starting to expire?

So the 90% still employed are taking the Obama money and movin on up!

I expect Sebastian to show up any minute now.

Not any funnier than the last time you said it.

Sebastian is always right.
At least in his world.

It blows me away to see ancient Greek and Roman structures still standing after a few thousand years, but what will be our legacy?

As if any SFH is going to stand the test of time...

When a foreclosed home is sold on the court steps does this count as a 'sale' on this survey?

If so, there are many homes being double counted due to foreclosure flipping.

ac wrote:

Sales back up to bubble levels!

Dr. Feelgood: or How I Learned To Ignore Reality And Embrace The Extend

So if the federal government makes the downpayment and finances the mortgage, the sheeple will buy houses. Sounds sustainable to me. Nothing like goosing sales near the cyclical low point of the year, then applying "seasonally adjusted" normalization factors to manufacture a green shoot.

Recycled foreclosure sales up sharply!

Up at bubble levels, seasonally adjusted. We all knew that there would at least be an unseasonable national bump in November. Presumably, December will reflect a give-back. If not in December, than in June. At some point the tax credit churn will exhaust itself.

But again, I'm not seeing any real activity here in > $400K houses in MetWest Boston. Tough market.

Interesting post from Big Picture:

Do Appliance Sales Signal the Start of Housing Uptick? | The Big Picture

Arguing that the uptick of 10% in appliance sales presages people staying put and taking advantage of low appliance prices, rather than an initial sign of a turn in new housing.

From my perspective, this seems like a good argument. We are hunkering down, but will buy if prices drop low enough.

Replacing a crappy tv with a shiny new flat panel is a pretty solid upgrade if you watch even a couple of hours of tv or dvds. Same with a fridge or stove.

Concrete example. I was in Target the other day and they have a 50" Panasonic plasma for $849. Looked just awesome.

Herculiam and Pompeii used to be sea ports. Now they are 1/2 to 1 mile inland.

YLSP World Exclusive (first time in MP3)
H. Ross Perot - Career Advice for the 21st Century
January 24, 1995 - Kansas State Landon Lecture Series

Unfortunately Rapidshare is telling me it can only be downloaded 10 times? Enjoy...

Trader/investor sentiment in the Gold futures market (as interpreted by way of recent Commitment of Trader (COT reports, put out by the CFTC every week) had been exceedingly (and unrealistically) bullish among large speculators (hedge funds) and small traders, suggesting that a significant correction was imminent. Not surprisingly, the exact opposite situation existed in the US Dollar Index’s COT sentiment interpretation – the large speculators had only just begun to acquire fresh long Dollar positions, meaning that the stage was being set for a complete ‘about face’ in both of these critical investment/commodity markets.

Technical Analysis Morning Trader: stock picks, scans and ideas for day trading and short-term trading using technical analysis.

.....If 1/3 of these home sales are "distressed" (foreclosure and short sales), what generally are these "distressed" sales figures normally in a "healthy" period?

We're from the department of home & land price security, and we just want to ask you some routine questions...

H. Ross Perot - Career Advice for the 21st Century (Megashares)
I believe this may have unrestricted downloads.

Enjoy everyone...

And, FYI, the "In the shadow of the valley of death" term, was originally coined by Art Bell in the late 90's to describe Pahrump Valley (next door to Death Valley) during his earlier Coast to Coast radio show broadcast from his radio station here in Pahrump - PRIOR to any Afghanistan involvement.

Next summer will be housing market hell.

Where are you Outsider? Just curious. Opposite situation in MetWest: prices still coming down above $400K. Summer was a remarkable break in price declines, but it started resuming in September.

Outsider wrote:

I have started to see listing prices rise

In what price range? My guess is the very low end. At least, that is the way it is where I live. High priced are falling or stagnant. Stagnant are not selling. Some still priced at 2006 levels.

Zillow said my homes value has increased and is now up by 20k since I moved in last year, so I'm good

In watching local real estate listings, I have started to see listing prices rise, whereas they used to drop.

Guess the word is getting out that sales are increasing

Looking at HousingTracker for my area the 25th percentile prices are rising while the 75th are still declining.

Easy Monetary Policy = Bubble

The question is does the bond market and/or shadow inventory ruin the party.

One thing is for certain:

The bubbles will not stop by any voluntary action on the part of our government or our monetary authority.

The bubbles will stop with the collapse of the monetary and political systems creating them.

Dickeylee wrote:
So the 90% still employed are taking the Obama money and movin on up!
We finally got a piece of the (ever-shrinking) pie (with ever-increasing demand).

In this comeback year for investors, David Tepper may have scored one of the biggest paydays of all.

Mr. Tepper's hedge-fund firm has racked up about $7 billion of profit so far this year—with Mr. Tepper on track to earn more than $2.5 billion for himself, according to people familiar with the matter. That is among the largest one-year takes in recent years.

Behind the wins: a bet worth billions of dollars that America would avoid a repeat of the Great Depression.

It's a shame David Tepper wasn't reading the commentariat's gloom and doom all year long or he would realize just how phony those billions of dollars in profits really are.

The TPTB are adding more fuel to the fire, on the hot air balloon that is the housing bubble.

If you gotta bail, i'd subscribe to the Kittinger Letter

YouTube - "This is the highest step in the world"

Purely anecdotal: High end Bay Area and fancy beach cities of SoCal residents are feeling like 2008 was an anomaly. Some recent quotes "things are surely getting back to normal" and "this spring selling season will be great" and "no one will underprice their home anymore, they'll just wait out this mess".

ac wrote:

Easy Monetary Policy = Bubble

I don't think it's that broad based. Housing market asset class has been the subject of acute focus for the USG... Simply because lenders are so exposed. The support is unprecedented in its scale and scope. At some point the support is going to stop, as assets (notes) have been getting transferred to USG hands, at a furious pace. If long rates ramp at the same time the USG pulls its price support and still lenders have impaired balance sheets and demand healthy margins we will see a secondary collapse. Looking to me like next summer.