Housing Remains an Albatross Around Neck of US Economy, May Continue for Decades
Housing has triple-dipped.
The latest Case-Shiller HPI shows that the downtrend in housing values has resumed, with the seasonally-adjusted 3-month moving average 20-city index falling a sharp 0.6% in September.
There continues to be mounting evidence that the bursting of the 1980s-2000s multi-decade housing & credit bubbles are resulting in a Japan-like spiral for the United States, with weaker recoveries, and more frequent recessions, as a result.
CNBC
As Home Prices Sink, Home Ownership Heads to New Lows
Home prices across the nation are now right back where they were at the beginning of 2003. All that was gained is largely now lost, and the effect on home ownership could continue for decades.
"Consumer attitudes have gotten a lot more negative about long-term commitment," said Standard and Poors' David Blitzer, after reporting home prices through September had fallen a deeper-than-expected 3.9 percent compared to the third quarter of 2010. "They dropped to new lows. This takes them below the point we saw in 2009, where briefly we all thought this thing was about to turn around."
And that's the problem.
Every time we think things are turning around in the housing market, we get hit with some new problem, like last year's so-called "robo-signing" foreclosure paperwork scandal, which managed to stall the cleansing of distress in the market for over a year. Now that foreclosures are ramping up again, prices are coming down again.
All this could push home ownership down to levels not seen at least since before the Census began tracking this data in 1963. Home ownership soared to 70 percent in 2005, but it could fall to 62 percent by 2015...
The latest Case-Shiller HPI shows that the downtrend in housing values has resumed, with the seasonally-adjusted 3-month moving average 20-city index falling a sharp 0.6% in September.
There continues to be mounting evidence that the bursting of the 1980s-2000s multi-decade housing & credit bubbles are resulting in a Japan-like spiral for the United States, with weaker recoveries, and more frequent recessions, as a result.
CNBC
As Home Prices Sink, Home Ownership Heads to New Lows
Home prices across the nation are now right back where they were at the beginning of 2003. All that was gained is largely now lost, and the effect on home ownership could continue for decades.
"Consumer attitudes have gotten a lot more negative about long-term commitment," said Standard and Poors' David Blitzer, after reporting home prices through September had fallen a deeper-than-expected 3.9 percent compared to the third quarter of 2010. "They dropped to new lows. This takes them below the point we saw in 2009, where briefly we all thought this thing was about to turn around."
And that's the problem.
Every time we think things are turning around in the housing market, we get hit with some new problem, like last year's so-called "robo-signing" foreclosure paperwork scandal, which managed to stall the cleansing of distress in the market for over a year. Now that foreclosures are ramping up again, prices are coming down again.
All this could push home ownership down to levels not seen at least since before the Census began tracking this data in 1963. Home ownership soared to 70 percent in 2005, but it could fall to 62 percent by 2015...