[dragnet2]

There were a few more people left to hoodwink and hustle.

You just know damn well where this is going...A few more people are going to get their bell rung...Hard

And now the banksters are attempting to lower the standards again for home loans?

This is an epic con-job...Bet the rent...Or mortgage

[a fool in paradise]

Flipping properties is nothing but speculator driven inflation of property values. Cities love it because they can use it to drive up evaluations for property taxes. New homeowner is stuck holding the bag.

[alloysteel]

Housing bubbles can happen? Why, why, this is PREPOSTEROUS! Investing in real estate is the safest thing around, they aren’t making any more land, you know.

But the world quickly runs out of suckers, and has to wait for the next generation of them to be born.

They come into the world, believing in the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy, Santa Claus, unicorns, pots of gold at the end of the rainbow....

And other silly promises.

[Personal Responsibility]

You just know damn well where this is going...A few more people are going to get their bell rung...Hard

---

The people who actually issue the bad loans and those who take them won’t wind up responsible. We will

[riri]

House prices here in Phoenix are near pre-bust. In a much softer job market. Granted there is some foreign investment, but I am not sure how much. I came back to the Valley last year after three years away and bought. My house has "appreciated" over 60k in that year. It can't hold.

I should add, also, after the bust--you couldn't give away one of these giant McMansions they build here. But, now they are building and selling them like hotcakes.They are ridiculous. One model in my neighborhood has 5,000 square ft. of which the upstairs consists of a couple of small rooms and a GIANT, GIANT big loft room--the size of three normal, large rooms. There is no way the average middle class family can afford to cool that for six months a year. I predict all those McMansions will once again be bought for the same price as the one story more modest homes. I swear people don't learn.

[jttpwalsh]

I live in OC, as I type this, new neighbors are moving in, across the street. The house was on the market for eight days, listed at $440K, final selling price $490K. The place down the street just listed, per Zillow, value increased $38K in 30 days. My own humble abode has “only” increased by $13K in 30 days, not that it matters too much, I am not going anywhere. I definitely have that Monopoly money sense, like in 2007, the only good thing I have heard is that lenders are not covering these huge spikes, the buyer has to come up with cash to cover the difference. Not sure how true it is, but one neighbor I trust, and knows the industry, confirmed this more conservative practice to me, last week, FWIW. Thanks.

[Wuli]

what some believe is happening is

(a) investors bought a large % of the foreclosed homes and homes that might have been foreclosed on if the owners did not sell, and

(b) they held onto a large % of those homes they bought,

(c) and after fixing/cleaning them up, or not, they have rented, not sold, many of them, which has kept a lot of them off the market for regular primary residence home buyers, and

(d) even in a down market, when there are still some buyers but fewer than before, low supply of “for sale” homes, even an artificially created low supply, can mean some buyers will pay a premium to buy a home.

In one case I know the details of, in a San Bernardino County suburb, a 1955-built 3-bedroom 1400sf 2car detached garage house (a) had an outrageous [I know the exact area very well] market value of $378,000 at the top of its price bubble in 2006; (b) foreclosed to the lender at $274,000 in May 2011, (c) sold for $95,0000 in Feb 2012 [the owner had been asking $114,900 since Dec 2011 after 4 months of not getting $144,900, (d) sold for $188,000 in July 2012, (d) is valued by zillow for $181,000 today, and (e) is up for sale now for $245,000.

With 12% unemployment in San Bernardino County, I question that the job/employment base there can support that kind of housing price increase, in that market. Yes $245,000 is still below the outrageous market value it had in 2006 and below what it foreclosed at in 2011, but in my view, knowing the area, neither of those values were justified, both were somewhere in the midst of the bubble prices in that area.

I am hearing similar reports of new really wide upswings in home prices from a number of S.California sources. I tell them what I know about the employment data and ask them where are the new jobs. They tell me they don’t know.

It all sounds like investor held inventory has been rented, kept off the market a lot, shrunk the for-sale supply, boosting for-sale prices even in this down market.

But, after their trickle sell-off of their rented inventory, at shrunken for-sale-supply price premiums, the econ growth, job growth and job stability data might not support what these houses are getting now, putting recent buyers underwater in a couple years in some places.

I guess on the theory of sell high and buy low one could only recommend to people in the midst of these local bubbles, if they desire to sell and if they can get a really good profit, go ahead and sell, but buy the replacement home in a different area that is not now seeing these price upswings. If that is not possible due to job & family circumstances (can’t leave the area), I’d be cautious about selling now and buying something else in the same area.

[Pelham]

“And now the banksters are attempting to lower the standards again for home loans? “

Cash buyers are driving the real estate market here in Orange County.

We have a lot of foreign buyers picking up mid priced houses for cash and renting them out.

[djf]

Pump and dump.

Same thing in the stock market.