John Rebchook is a former Rocky Mountain News reporter with more than 30 years of experience in writing and communications... In my most recent blog I told of how Robert Shiller, the Yale University economics professor and author of Irrational Exuberance, said the housing market is sending mixed signals.
“I like that phrase, “Showing mixed signals,” said Realtor Thomas Cryer.
“Clearly, that is what is going on,” said Cryer, a broker associate at the Kentwood Co..
“I have the enviable, or maybe dubious, position right now of a listing over $1 million and listings under $200,000,” Cryer added. “Stuff under $200,000 is typically receiving multiple offers and the stuff over $1 million, you are hoping to get a showing. That would be one level of mixed signals.”
Cryer said another “level of mixed signals is that we really do not know how long and how deep this foreclosure cycle is going to take us.” He said the Mortgage Bankers Association recently reported that about 13 percent of mortgages are at least one payment behind.
“We never hit anything like that even in the deepest and darkest day of the late ’80s and early ’90s foreclosure cycle in Denver,” he said. “Only 6 or 7 or 8 percent ever missed payment, and maybe only 2 percent, or slightly less, actually made it to the (end) of the foreclosure cycle,” with an auction of the property by the public trustee office.
Recovery period long
He noted that in the previous Denver crash came after a peak in 1984 and did not hit bottom until 1992.
“People were wondering back then why prices were going up and we were still having new foreclosures,” Cryer said. “Well, if prices go up 10 percent, but the market had gone down 30 percent, you can still be in trouble.”
That said, buying in 1998 or 1999, would have been a savvy financial move. And that may be where the market is today.
“I truly believe, if we are not at the bottom…the anchor is dragging along the bottom,” Cryer said. “It may bounce up or it may go deeper. But if you have the opportunity to be a buyer now, I could not imagine a better time to buy. We have historic low interest rates, and prices, in some respects, are where they were 10 years ago. And the credit markets have made it so tough to qualify for a loan, there is still not much competition for (the move-up and beyond) houses. It truly is a perfect storm for buying.”
[...] Cryer says Shiller correct about mixed signals: I have the enviable, or maybe dubious, position right now of a listing over $1 million and listings under $200,000,â¿ Cryer added. Stuff under $200,000 is typically receiving multiple offers and the stuff over $1 million, you are hoping to get a showing. Go to Article (Insiderealestatenews.com) [...]