This headline has me shaking my head…
Bad news for housing: Prices flattening
By Les Christie, staff writerDecember 29, 2009: 10:20 AM ET
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Home price gains earlier this year flattened out in October, according to a report issued Tuesday.
The S&P/Case Shiller Home Price index, covering 20 of the largest metropolitan areas in the nation, was unchanged in October, after four consecutive months of gains. The index is down 7.3% from 12 months earlier.
http://money.cnn.com/2009/12/29/real_estate/October_home_prices/
It seems that everywhere the emphasis is on a desperate desire for things going back to the way they were in the financial and real estate markets. Don’t these “experts” get it? That’s exactly what we don’t want! I realize that people who bought at the peak got screwed, but why make houses unaffordable all over again? If I sold my house today, I’d get at least $100,000 less than what it was allegedly worth a few years ago, but that would be at least $100,000 more than what I paid for it — which happens to be about what we’ve spent on improvements. So with the mortgage interest being tax-deductible we come out even, and that’s fine with me.
The real estate bubble was another gigantic pyramid scheme, with unqualified buyers and investors being pushed into the bottom to hold up a few who ran the schemes. In a bizarre irony, it was the collapse of Wall Street that forced Bernie Madoff to come forward. In a way, I can almost understand why the SEC failed to nail Madoff. Was there any real difference between what he was up to, and what the deregulated markets were doing?
Speaking of Madoff, there were reports everywhere last week that he had been rather badly beaten up in prison. Since then I’ve seen nothing about it.