Has the Bubble Finally Burst?
The NY Post certainly thinks so. They report that single-family home prices fell in the city 7.4% from July of ’07 to July ’08 (though the number is 16.3% for cities they surveyed overall). They point to a Park Slope brownstone whose price has sunk from $2.8 million in January to $2.35 million now; still…
The NY Post certainly thinks so. They report that single-family home prices fell in the city 7.4% from July of ’07 to July ’08 (though the number is 16.3% for cities they surveyed overall). They point to a Park Slope brownstone whose price has sunk from $2.8 million in January to $2.35 million now; still seems like pretty close to bubble prices to some folks around here. We’ve been seeing prices fall in some new condo projects around town. So is this it, the moment you’ve been dreading or dreaming of?
NY $$-Home Bubble Bursts [NY Post]
Bubble. Photo by Pepa….!
Sorry, you FINISH paying off your mortgage. Stopping paying will you into a heap of trouble!
“rolling blackouts and food shortages”….I heard that things are going to get so bad so fast that when The Road movie comes out they are going to classify it as non-fiction
I may have missed it but I don’t think that anyone has brought up that fact that at some point you stop paying a mortgage. Then you’re free and clear (less taxes and general upkeep) to bank your money rather than paying rent.
lechacal & Biff Champion
I’m getting off topic so I’ll just start a forum post.
Well, not much to add here, except I think the bubble has popped but not yet deflated.
I just renewed my lease for another year. I didn’t even argue with the (small) rent increase — I could probably find a cheaper rental on the market now but after paying moving costs and going through the hassle of moving it wouldn’t be worth it to me.
Things are unraveling faster than I thought (I thought it would be 2009 before all the investment banks were gone), but I still think it will be another year before things really hit NYC (when severance packages run out and people accept that Wall Street isn’t hiring like it use to).
I hope we are not in for painful economic times in the general economy, but it looks like we are. My advice: keep cash and keep it FDIC insured. Worry about returns another year.
oh please Polemicist – you must be joking. Are you actually implying that our citizenry is more exclusive and entitled in our outlook than Argentines? Have you spent any time in Latin America? Americans have shown many times in our history that when bad things happen we have extraordinary reserves of civic virtue to call upon.
That being said – don’t you think predictions of “rolling black outs and food shortages” are a bit extreme? You are really too much!
Well just agreeing with even some of his points gives me a migraine, but there’s much to what polemicist says. Don’t know that I agree with the issue of serious social unrest though- certainly not the escape from NY scenario. My fear is that we love sticking with the status quo because our political system is so ponderous and so balkanized itself that most of them care more about retaining their seat than the good of the country.
Not only does our financial sector need an overhaul, we need to take a good long look at how we put people in office- or maybe the kind of people we put in office. If Mccain and Palin win, that will well prove my point. Garbage in, garbage out.
Also, I don’t know if everyone caught Robert Shiller’s take on this mess from this past Sunday
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09/26/AR2008092602838.html?hpid=opinionsbox1
Also a good read, and quite relevant in light of all the Case-Shiller index talk.
11217:
Unfortunately, your sentiment doesn’t have much to do with real estate or even human behavior in general.
It’s a nice sentiment, don’t get me wrong. I’m all about free ice cream, endless sunshine, a chicken in every pot, and a puppy on every lap. But I’m also a realist. New York City is not Buenos Aires. When food shortages become a reality and rolling blackouts not uncommon, you can expect serious civil unrest unknown there. It is likely before that happens, consumer goods and the luxuries of life will become out of reach for all but the well off. Without distractions, we will have some problems.
We really are at the precipice of a serious economic collapse, and I’m not confident we have the necessary civic virtue to overcome such an event, if it were to occur.
There is a sense of entitlement and exclusion that permeates our society that limits cooperation and breeds resentment. I try to highlight it with the NIMBY phenomenon, but also with the level of acceptance of identity politics and the balkanization of our neighborhoods. When the government ceases to have the ability to effectively deal with the coming crisis, the various insular groups of this city will become intolerant of outsiders.
Only the Soviet Union provides us with an acceptable modern analogy, given our similar economic situation, military encumbrances, and centralized control. There is a fabulous book on the subject that came out recently, I encourage everyone to read it:
http://www.amazon.com/Reinventing-Collapse-Example-American-Prospects/dp/0865716064/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1222881138&sr=8-1