How bad is the RE market in YOUR neighborhood/area/city/state?

[JohnG72]

Originally Posted by JonHomeHunter

Then CA will finally be a true buyer's market. All of the offers I have put on in the last 4 months have been outbid!

You have to factor in a few things about the CA market:

1.) Buyers are HEAVILY overestimating the advantage of the $8,000 tax credit. Ask any buyer right now why they are buying and this will be one of the answers. But its a 2% discount on a $400K home...akin to getting a candy bar that is normally $0.50 for $0.49.

2.) Many many many shady realtors in Southern California. "There are multiple bids" is the standard. This results in a feeding frenzy attitude amoung those that are emotionally driven in their housing purchase. Its not always true.

3.) Much inventory is not being released to market. This is artificially creating a shortage of decent houses that is directly linked to #2.

4.) I also think So Cal buyers are heavily overestimating the impact of low interest rates. What I am hearing is that most buyers are putting a lot down(in some cases 40-60%). If this is so, right now is probably the worst time ever for them to buy since prices should drop when interest rates rise. Notice I said "when", not "if". Interest rates are impossibly low right now, and can't get lower. So there is no "if". It's just a matter of when.

IMO, just sit and wait. The conventional wisdom right now amoung people actively looking to buy in So Cal is "Best time to buy ever", and that old standby "Real estate is never a bad investment". If you repeat the stuff I said here, your co workers and friends will look at you like you are crazy. So even though some internet sites are bearish on the housing market, most out there are not. And really we are at the tipping point. The market made its "correction", did its fake recovery, and is now ready for a multi year plunge. This is more true in So Cal than every where else.

[MovedfromFL]

Originally Posted by mcm2010

Where specifically did you find a Case-Shiller index for your particular house? And future values?

I'm looking over their website, and Atlanta is only showing a 4% drop YOY.

My real estate agent gave me a report. (looks like a spreadsheet she created) She first gave me the report back in December, then I had her run it again in March. The current value and projected values are all lower now than they were in December.

I'm going to ask her where she got the data and if I can run some addresses in FL that we are interested in. Might as well take advantage of that info. I couldn't find it by individual house on the internet either.