The Housing Bubble Builds

Grok Headline matches for The Housing Bubble Builds

Pop Goes the Global Housing Bubble

Pop Goes the Global Housing Bubble 06/17/2005 04:21 PM
The Global Housing Price Bubble is bursting. Prices are already declining in Australia and Britain. The Economist has another story that outlines how a global bursting of this bubble could be deleterious to the world's economy. The bubble is bigger than the stock market bubble of the late 90s. Will there be a smooth landing or will spending collapse when it cannot be funded on housing price gains?

Annals of the Housing Bubble

Annals of the Housing Bubble 05/21/2004 10:01 PM

Mercury News (reg req): Median home prices pass half-million mark. The median price of resale houses sold in the Bay Area reached $520,000 last month -- the first time that figure has exceeded the half-million point.

Lunacy.

Housing Bubble, Continued

Housing Bubble, Continued 04/11/2004 01:19 PM

Mercury News: As offers pour in, cutthroat market a boon for sellers. The fast-paced, competitive nature of this spring's Bay Area housing market has participants and observers alike speculating on the reasons -- particularly after three years of severe job losses.

The story goes on to offer all the usual reasons, such as a shortage of houses and low interest rates. But there's another very good explanation: rampant speculation of another kind, inducing panic buying like the kind that occurred in the stock market in the late 1990s. This is a bubble that will deflate eventually. It's happening elsewhere, as this NY Times story notes today. The mania will end here, too, and it'll be ugly.

The Housing Bubble, Continued

The Housing Bubble, Continued 06/19/2004 12:14 PM

Mercury News (reg req): Economy boosts valley home prices. The median price of a home in Santa Clara County reached $590,000, up 20.2 percent from May 2003, according to DataQuick Information Systems. A total of 2,149 resale houses changed hands in the county last month, a nearly 30 percent increase from a year earlier.

It's much more than the economy at work here. It's a mindless, dangerous bubble that shows what a short attention span human beings have when they are infected with greed and/or panic. This particular news story ends witha local public defender who found a lender that offered a "zero-down" loan -- that is, loaned the full selling price with no down payment. I can understand the borrower's motive, though I think it's an incredibly risky move, but the bank making this loan is just irresponsible. So is the real-estate industry that promotes this kind thing, but that's par for the course. Of course, the lender will now push this mortgage into the national market, offloading it to some other company. This is how we have such liquid markets, and the system was a boon in the past, greased as it has been by the likes of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, the giant federal home-loan operations that act as though they have the full faith and credit of the U.S. taxpayer behind them even though they do not. But it is not sustainable, yet nobody in power dares mess with this machinery. What we'll see eventually, if we don't find a way to slowly deflate this bubble, is a massive collapse of the housing market that will in turn spark a severe recession. The truly scary scenario, still not the most likely but growing in probability every day, comes when falling prices for housing lead to massive collapses in the financial industry. But if that occurs, the Fannie Maes and Freddie Macs and the money-center banks with big exposure will be considered too big to fail. We taxpayers will bail them out to the tune of several trillion dollars, an amount that'll make the S&L bailout of the 1980s seem tiny. And the only way that will work will be to re-ignite inflation on an absolutely massive scale, because the only way to make it work will be to ratchet up the money supply in unprecedented fashion. This is a bubble. It will deflate. If it doesn't deflate gently, the nation is in for the worst kind of pain.

Who Cares About the Housing Bubble?

Who Cares About the Housing Bubble? 04/13/2004 10:07 AM
A swig of Pepto and a small perspective shift is overdue.

Freddie Mac: No Housing Bubble

Freddie Mac: No Housing Bubble 07/30/2004 12:20 PM
Salim Haji gets the scoop on why Freddie Mac believes that the U.S. real estate market today is rational.

Housing bubble fears 'overblown'

Housing bubble fears 'overblown' 06/23/2004 06:15 AM
Concerns that the booming buy-to-let business could cause a house price crash are overblown, a new survey says.

Housing market: Will the bubble burst?

Housing market: Will the bubble burst? 06/15/2004 04:59 AM
The Bank of England says house prices could be unsustainable and interest rate rises may hit owners. Send us your reaction.

Housing price bubble and inflation risk

Housing price bubble and inflation risk 12/17/2004 06:35 PM

Morgan Stanley economist, Stephen Roach, has an interesting article on America's housing price bubble dated December 1, 2004.  Right underneath this piece is something about how investors believe that the risk of high inflation is growing.  I've been poking at buying a larger/more open place to live here in Cambridge and Roach's theory seems about right.  Central Square is a place with pretty high crime rates (the city owns much of the housing in the area and fills it up with people they deem to be jobless and hopeless).  The public schools are so bad in the city that almost every family with children who cares about education moves to Brookline, Newton, Lincoln, etc.  I looked at a place for sale at 33 Bigelow St. the other week.  It is just half of a house.  All of the floors and stairs are sloped and creaking due to settling over the years.  I went over with an architect friend and he took me down to the basement:  "See this framework of steel bars and 2x4s that has been slapped together underneath the beams?  That's what is keeping the whole place from collapsing.  I would be very worried about you buying this house."  Asking price?  $1.25 million.

Of course, if there is enough inflation it will turn out to be a good deal because $1.25 million will be a normal annual salary...

Housing Bubble News: Adjustable Rate
Mortgages Stretch Borrowers

Housing Bubble News: Adjustable Rate
Mortgages Stretch Borrowers 05/16/2004 12:21 PM

Reuters: Popular ARM loans can misfire for some homebuyers. "Those stretching to get into a home by using that (ARM) as a tool but haven't planned ahead are going to get into trouble," warned Douglas Duncan, chief economist at the Mortgage Bankers Association.

So why are Duncan's members enticing borrowers so ardently with ARM-based loans? This is like the credit-card industry, which whines about delinquent consumers but does everything in its power to sign up new customers who will have trouble paying.

Bubble or no bubble, that is the
question

Bubble or no bubble, that is the
question 04/14/2004 09:13 AM
"The real estate bubble's gonna pop!" You seem to hear that all the time... But dig deeper and you find that other people don't even think there's a bubble. Others think there's a bubble, but it's gonna keep growing. Then, just to make it interesting, you've got others who said the bubble was going to pop back in 2002. Why is first-time home-buying this friggin' difficult?!

i-Buddie USB 2 HDD Housing

i-Buddie USB 2 HDD Housing 11/18/2003 11:34 AM
vnunet.com Nov 18 2003 10:29AM ET

So Why Are Housing Prices Still Rising
Here?

So Why Are Housing Prices Still Rising
Here? 03/08/2004 11:18 PM
SF Chronicle: Offshoring's giant target. Jobs are more likely to be shipped overseas from Silicon Valley than any other region in the nation, placing the Bay Area's economic engine directly in the path of the global freight train known as offshoring.

DIY Underwater Camera Housing

DIY Underwater Camera Housing 06/21/2004 01:43 PM

This do-it-yourself waterproof camera enclosure is pretty involved, and isn't the sort of thing you'd want to screw up, even a little, but if you're handy with the heat gun and aren't afraid to get your handheld deburring tool with swiveling cutter a little dirty, you can take pretty much any type of camera you'd like into the drink. Of course, if they make an underwater housing for your camera, it would probably just be easier to buy that, and maybe a little more reliable. Also, just for the record, this will work with your pet turtle Sub Captain Sandy, but only for about three minutes or so.
Read [mit.edu/~tim via GeekDIY]

Housing curbs for new EU migrants

Housing curbs for new EU migrants 04/26/2004 06:45 PM
Tony Blair will announce curbs on "economically inactive" migrants from new and would-be EU states.

Dow Down 43 After Drop in Housing Starts
(AP)

Dow Down 43 After Drop in Housing Starts
(AP) 02/18/2004 08:15 PM
AP - A drop in housing starts and a rally in the U.S. dollar on currency markets sent stocks lower Wednesday as the news gave investors an incentive to collect profits.

No compassion in housing proposal

No compassion in housing proposal 09/22/2004 10:33 AM
Funny, we didn't hear any of the Republicans who used New York City as the backdrop of their convention last month talking about the administration's plans to fo rce poor families to either pay hundreds of dollars in extra rent or go homeless. But we're sure George Pataki, Michael Bloomberg, and Rudy Giuliani are going to talk to their Republican friends in Washington and take care of this pronto.

finally, affordable housing!

finally, affordable housing! 03/17/2005 03:20 AM
Build a huge house for only $782?! Low-cost housing for the masses! Unfortunately, you have to travel back in time to build houses for less than $1000. How many of these homes are in your town or on your block? (courtesy of J-Walk)

Nailing the Housing Market

Nailing the Housing Market 03/22/2005 06:34 PM
KB Home reports excellent first-quarter results. But investors beware.

UK housing boom continues

UK housing boom continues 04/29/2004 05:01 AM
House prices have picked up again, rising by 2.1% during April, but may cool in the second half of the year says the Nationwide.

H2O Audio SV i700 Waterproof MP3 Housing

H2O Audio SV i700 Waterproof MP3 Housing 09/09/2004 07:52 PM

Anders Steele (someone's mom had high hopes) sent me this image of the H2O Audio SV i700 MP3 player that I thought I'd pass along. H2O Audio doesn't make the MP3 player inside - that's an iRiver iFP-870 - but instead designed the waterproof housing and fully submirsible headphones. You can even use regular headphones while the unit is still inside the housing, or remove it for regular, dry land daily use. The SV i700 housing is a lot better than the earlier H2O models, if for no other reason because it's not ridiculously huge anymore.

Look - Full Sized Image [Gizmodo]
Read - H2O Audio SV i700 [ZDNet]

Related
Underwater Archive [Gizmodo]

Internet influence on housing confirmed

Internet influence on housing confirmed 07/01/2004 05:25 AM
Sgvtribune.com - Thu Jul 1, 07:09 am GMT

Housing fears over disorder bill

Housing fears over disorder bill 06/23/2004 01:17 AM
The amount of rented accommodation could be seriously reduced as a result of a new law, it is warned.

Valley housing market stays hot

Valley housing market stays hot 04/15/2005 08:58 PM
San Jose Mercury News Apr 16 2005 12:26AM GMT

Housing demand leads to more 'flipping'

Housing demand leads to more 'flipping' 04/15/2005 08:58 PM
San Jose Mercury News Apr 16 2005 12:23AM GMT

Shelter: A Quest for Non-Toxic Housing

Shelter: A Quest for Non-Toxic Housing 03/13/2003 10:16 AM

Fire at sheltered housing complex

Fire at sheltered housing complex 08/18/2004 07:01 PM
Firefighters tackle a blaze in Edinburgh and evacuate the building, as 20 residents need new accommodation.

N.Y. Officer Kills Man in Housing
Project

N.Y. Officer Kills Man in Housing
Project 01/24/2004 05:00 PM
Reuters via Wired News Jan 24 2004 8:30PM GMT

Housing association polices mobile net
use

Housing association polices mobile net
use 09/13/2004 09:45 PM
Computer Weekly Sep 14 2004 1:48AM GMT

Housing Agencies Look to Their Pocket
PCs for Paperless Inspections

Housing Agencies Look to Their Pocket
PCs for Paperless Inspections 12/30/2004 06:52 AM
Pocket PC Thoughts Dec 30 2004 10:54AM GMT

Construction cos. to foray into overseas
housing market

Construction cos. to foray into overseas
housing market 05/31/2004 08:22 AM
Maekyung Internet May 31 2004 12:43PM GMT

Gunmen Kill 10 in Saudi Housing Compound
(AP)

Gunmen Kill 10 in Saudi Housing Compound
(AP) 05/29/2004 09:18 PM
AP - Suspected Islamic militants wearing military-style uniforms sprayed gunfire inside two office compounds in the heart of the Saudi oil production region Saturday, killing at least 10 people — including an American — and then taking dozens of hostages at a luxury expatriate resort.

Housing Starts Fell in May, Permits Jump

Housing Starts Fell in May, Permits Jump 06/16/2004 09:56 AM
Reuters via Wired News Jun 16 2004 2:19PM GMT

Housing crunch revives old cities
(USATODAY.com)

Housing crunch revives old cities
(USATODAY.com) 06/24/2004 06:19 AM
USATODAY.com - The quest for affordable housing is fueling the explosive growth of suburban cities in the Sun Belt and even reviving some old industrial cities in the Northeast, according to population estimates out Thursday.

Chimps From Dutch Lab Face Housing
Crisis

Chimps From Dutch Lab Face Housing
Crisis 08/20/2004 01:02 AM
Abcnews.go.com - Thu Aug 19, 09:57 pm GMT

Protecting Yourself From A Housing Slump
(BusinessWeek Online)

Protecting Yourself From A Housing Slump
(BusinessWeek Online) 12/28/2004 08:48 AM
BusinessWeek Online - In many U.S. cities, the housing market looks as extravagant and top-heavy as a Dr. Seuss castle. In metro New York, the median price of a single-family house is up 78% since 1999, according to the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight. The gains are even bigger in Miami (87%), Los Angeles (97%), and San Diego (115%). For years house prices in these markets have risen faster than family incomes. The trend made sense when mortgage interest rates were falling, but rates hit bottom in mid-2003 and they're likely to rise. Put it all together, says Yale University economist Robert J. ...

Consumer Confidence Soars, Housing
Strong

Consumer Confidence Soars, Housing
Strong 07/27/2004 09:38 PM
Reuters via Wired News Jul 28 2004 1:46AM GMT

Confidence Surges, Housing Strong
(Reuters)

Confidence Surges, Housing Strong
(Reuters) 07/27/2004 11:12 AM
Reuters - U.S. new home sales slipped 0.8 percent in June, a smaller decline than expected, and consumer confidence surged this month as low mortgage rates combined forces with a strengthening economy, reports showed on Tuesday.

Green Housing Takes Root in Oregon

Green Housing Takes Root in Oregon 09/20/2004 03:17 AM

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The Housing Bubble Builds

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