Real Estate To Come Back Soon?

[uptowngirl]

Me too EasyE. I have yelled at people throwing their Steele Reserve cans in my yard and they "promise they will come back later and pick it up" What a joke! The litters in JAX have no shame, none at all...

[second_pancake]

Ok, for those of you who have had your homes on the market for less than a week and say you have sold them, where exactly are they located?  I have had my 1200 sq ft bungalow on the market for over a year listed almost 90k LESS than houses for sale 2-3 houses down, it's in perfect condition, in Avondale (zip 32205) and I didn't have a SINGLE showing and only one offer of 80k from an investor right when the market went tits up.  I see more houses coming up for sale than I see signs coming down from sales, and while you say that there are houses that have sold above the asking price, what was the asking price, similar to mine...90k below market?  Were they also short-sales or REO/distressed properties??  Can't really use those as a measure to what is selling and what isn't.

I truly hope that the speculations/predictions being made in the article are right, but just based on the statistical data, while it's moving in the right direction, we're still looking at 2010-2011 before the average citizen will see the difference. 

Until credit restrictions are loosened, the only buyers will continue to be cash-buyers and investors.  There is a huge number of people looking to buy a house but can't because the deal falls through at the closing table due to insufficient credit requirements.  Unless you are someone (see investor above) who has 80k-100k lying around and can pay down your LTV, the odds of you getting a 30 yr fixed with the standard 20% down are low.

We can look at the data that's posted here all day about the percentage of homes selling vs. the number on the MLS, or how many homeowner's we have here, or what the median home values are, but that doesn't mean jack unless you look at the price paid for the home at last sale compared to the value at that time (real estate BPO, not tax/market value which is usually $10,000 more than the actual), factor in the amount the purchaser invested (downpayment), what they own on the property now and what the CURRENT value is.  There are so many factors that the average person and reporter doesn't look at.  MANY of our homes are what is considered 'distressed' and while some may be selling, the seller is walking away with nothing and in many cases are cutting checks to the bank to pay the difference.

[Joe]

I can only speak to personal experience, but I recently bought a home (which was fun in this market, because I got a great deal). We searched from about January through May, and I kept track of tons of houses through my realtor's online portal.

During that timeframe there were hundred of houses that went off the market within weeks of being listed. There were also hundreds of houses that stayed on the market the entire time - and are probably still on the market.

Honestly, none of it was ever a surprise, because the houses that sold quickly were priced very well. You could actually tell from the listing the day it popped up on the computer - "Oh, this one isn't going to last long." Sure enough, it would go sale pending within a month.

However, the trend was that people who had owned their house for less than 3 years were getting totally screwed. They would have it on the market for $10k or $20k more than they paid for it - in a feeble attempt to barely break even on fees and improvements - but the houses were still just totally overpriced. Conversely, people who had owned the house for 10 years were able to give a lower price, because they didn't have to worry as much about the unwarranted appreciation from '02-'05.

[second_pancake]

I can only speak to personal experience, but I recently bought a home (which was fun in this market, because I got a great deal). We searched from about January through May, and I kept track of tons of houses through my realtor's online portal.

During that timeframe there were hundred of houses that went off the market within weeks of being listed. There were also hundreds of houses that stayed on the market the entire time - and are probably still on the market.

Honestly, none of it was ever a surprise, because the houses that sold quickly were priced very well. You could actually tell from the listing the day it popped up on the computer - "Oh, this one isn't going to last long." Sure enough, it would go sale pending within a month.

However, the trend was that people who had owned their house for less than 3 years were getting totally screwed. They would have it on the market for $10k or $20k more than they paid for it - in a feeble attempt to barely break even on fees and improvements - but the houses were still just totally overpriced. Conversely, people who had owned the house for 10 years were able to give a lower price, because they didn't have to worry as much about the unwarranted appreciation from '02-'05.

Just wanted to point out that when a house "went off" the market doesn't mean it sold.  Another new trend that is happening is a house that has been on the market for a significant period of time, will be taken off the mls for 30-60 days and then will be placed back on the market.  After the 30-60 day time period, the home will appear on the MLS as only having been on the market for a day and none of the previous market history is retained.  Tricky.  It's a way to prevent potential buyers from looking at a property and offering a lower price due to the appearance that the home is distressed, and helps realtors keep the listing prices stable. 

Btw, I've owned my house for over 4 years and like I said, it was priced 90k under market.  It's now a rental.

[RiversideGator]

Clearly there is still a big backlog of unsold homes in Jax.  It will take a while for the market to work through this.  The good news is Jacksonville is growing in jobs and population and income so time is on our side.  Now, if you are like Second Pancake with a home listed now that wont sell, this is little consolation.  The best thing to do in that case is to rent it out until market conditions improve.  Glad to hear that you were able to find a renter, SP.  Good luck with selling it down the road.   

[RiversideGator]

Signs of a bottom even in California:

California's Discount Foreclosure Sales Point to Housing Bottom

By Dan Levy and Daniel Taub

July 31 (Bloomberg) -- California led the U.S. into the worst housing recession since the 1930s. Now the most populous state may be the first to find the bottom.

In Stockton, the U.S. metro area with the highest foreclosure rate, home sales more than doubled in the second quarter after prices fell by an average 37 percent, said PMZ Real Estate Corp., the area's largest broker. Across the state, sales rose for three consecutive months starting in April after 30 straight months of declines, the California Association of Realtors said. About 40 percent of those transactions were foreclosure sales, DataQuick Information Systems reported.

``California is having a wrenching decline in wealth, but this is a cathartic event that will lay the foundation for a recovery,'' said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Economy.com in West Chester, Pennsylvania, in an interview. ``This signals the beginning of the end.''

Almost $1.3 trillion of homeowner equity was lost in California since home prices peaked in December 2005, Zandi said. Discounts of as much as 50 percent will extend into 2010, helping clear a glut of foreclosures and leading to a more balanced housing market, said Ryan Ratcliff, an economist at the Anderson Forecast at the University of California in Los Angeles, and Christopher Thornberg, principal of Beacon Economics LLC in Los Angeles.

``Half off in a decent neighborhood is close to the bottom,'' said Bill Gross, co-chief investment officer of Newport Beach, California-based Pacific Investment Management Co., manager of the world's biggest bond fund. Property markdowns of 30 percent to 40 percent give the market ``price illumination if not sunshine,'' he said.

`Beginning to Happen'

California led the U.S. in default notices and bank seizures for the 18th straight month in June and had seven of the 10 metro areas with the highest foreclosure rates, according to Irvine, California-based RealtyTrac Inc., which sells default data. That drove down prices and led to ``discounted distressed sales,'' with two-thirds of transactions under $500,000, compared with 40 percent a year earlier, the California Association of Realtors said.

The amount of time it would take to deplete the supply of homes decreased to 7.7 months from 10.2 months a year earlier, and the median price fell 38 percent to $368,250 last month, according to the Realtors.

``Things are beginning to happen,'' said Karl Case, professor of economics at Wellesley College in Wellesley, Massachusetts, and co-creator of the S&P/Case-Shiller home-price index. ``We're not going to get reestablished in a stable market unless that inventory gets cleared out.''

Birth of Subprime

California led the boom in the U.S. housing market, as prices in the state more than doubled from 2000 to 2005, fueled by historically low interest rates, according to the Chicago-based National Association of Realtors.

As values soared, California gave birth to the subprime mortgage industry that specialized in lending to borrowers with poor or limited credit, who often used them to buy homes they couldn't afford, said Stephen Levy, director of the Center for the Continuing Study of the California Economy in Palo Alto.

Subprime products included ``zero-percent'' loans that needed no down payment, adjustable-rate mortgages, known as ``exploding ARMs'' because low interest rates rose after two or three years, and ``Alt-A'' or ``no-doc'' loans requiring no proof of income.

Almost half of the 25 biggest U.S. subprime lenders were based in the state, including New Century Financial Corp. in Irvine and ACC Capital Holdings in Orange, and a quarter of the country's subprime loans were issued there, more than in any other state, according to Inside Mortgage Finance and data from San Francisco-based research firm LoanPerformance.

County Breakdowns

Defaults on those loans began to accelerate in 2006, helping to push California into the lead in foreclosures.

Foreclosure sales accounted for 75 percent of June's total in Merced County, home to the Merced metro area with the country's second-highest foreclosure rate; 72 percent in Stanislaus County, home to the Modesto metro area with the third-highest foreclosure rate; and 66 percent in San Joaquin County, home to Stockton, data from DataQuick in La Jolla, California, and RealtyTrac show.

Sales of foreclosed properties equaled 63 percent of the total in Sacramento County, 62 percent in Riverside County, 58 percent in Solano County, 57 percent in San Bernardino County and 49 percent in Contra Costa County. Prices dropped as much 37 percent in those counties, DataQuick reported.

`Seen the Light'

About 1 million U.S. homes will be in some stage of foreclosure by the end of the year, and properties seized by banks will eventually sell at an average discount of 30 percent to 33 percent, said Rick Sharga, executive vice president for marketing at RealtyTrac.

Discounts will be higher in areas such as Stockton, about 80 miles east of San Francisco in California's agricultural Central Valley, and Riverside, 50 miles east of Los Angeles, that experienced above-average levels of new construction at the peak of the housing boom and where lenders made a disproportionate number of subprime loans, Sharga said.

PMZ, the Stockton-based brokerage, closed 1,707 home transactions in the second quarter, about 80 percent of them foreclosure sales, said Michael Zagaris, the company's president. Foreclosed homes are now getting multiple bids and the supply of homes for sale in San Joaquin and Stanislaus counties shrank to 4.9 months in June from 18.2 months a year earlier, he said.

``We've found the bottom,'' Zagaris said. ``The financial institutions have seen the light and are allowing the market to find its own level.''

Loan Values

Bank-owned properties attract investors who can rent out the homes for 10 percent of the purchase price annually, said Sean O'Toole, founder of real estate auction Web site ForeclosureRadar in Discovery Bay, California. ``Those deals are starting to pop up and putting a floor on the market,'' he said.

Bruce Norris, president of the Norris Group investment firm in Riverside, said he purchased foreclosed properties for one- third of the outstanding loan value during the past two months.

Norris bought a three-bedroom home in the Moreno Valley section of Riverside for $106,000, a 65 percent discount on the $300,000 loan held by Bear Stearns Cos., now part of JPMorgan Chase & Co. He got a 61 percent discount on a home with $258,750 in loans held by Deutsche Bank AG, and a 63 percent discount for a home with $324,000 in loans held by Morgan Stanley, he said.

``The banks are stuck wholesaling to people like me,'' Norris said. ``They are starting to move product faster than the market would normally allow.''

Housing Bill

Banks will foreclose on about 700,000 properties with subprime mortgages this year, more than double the number a year ago, Sharga estimated. The increase is prompting overwhelmed banks to hire more workers to process purchase offers.

Executives from Charlotte, North Carolina-based Bank of America Corp. and Wells Fargo & Co. in San Francisco told Congress last week that they've accelerated the pace of loan modifications and added personnel to help homeowners avoid foreclosure. Wells Fargo, which services one in eight U.S. mortgages, expanded its staff to more than 1,000 from 200 in 2005.

The housing bill signed by President George W. Bush yesterday is intended to stem foreclosures and includes a program backed by the Federal Housing Administration to insure as much as $300 billion in refinanced mortgages, including many subprime loans.

Housing in Stockton and Riverside sprang up during the boom as builders purchased cheap land and potential buyers sought affordable homes away from expensive coastal cities, said Levy at the Center for the Continuing Study of the California Economy.

Stockton Couple

Inland home values mirrored coastal gains until a wave of ``insane'' subprime and Alt-A mortgages started in 2005 and resulted in record defaults, Levy said.

``All of those markets suffering from higher foreclosures are where prices went too high and leverage was applied too excessively,'' Pimco's Gross said. The housing bill will ``put a floor on certain mortgages'' and help stop price declines, he said.

Homeowners like computer consultant David Imig and his wife, Deborah, who live in the Stockton area and owe more than their house is worth, aren't helped by the bill. They paid $462,000 for a three-bedroom at the market peak in 2005. Now, their neighbor's foreclosed home is on sale for half its original price.

``We're a good $100,000 down,'' Imig said. ``If we could move without taking a huge bath, we would.''

Past Busts

Previous California housing busts had roots in local economic woes and U.S. monetary policy. The state lost 350,000 jobs in the early 1990s, about two-thirds in the aerospace industry, according to the Cato Institute and Los Angeles County Economic Development Corp. Home prices tumbled 12 percent. In the early 1980s, existing-home sales dropped 61 percent amid interest rates of more than 14 percent and a national recession, the state Realtors said.

California may rebound more quickly from this decline than regions with fewer delinquencies and vacant homes, according to Zandi of Moody's Economy.com. The foreclosure process is ``more efficient'' than in states such as Florida where courts are involved, and Californians are typically ``more optimistic'' about housing after experiencing busts that were followed by property booms, Zandi said.

``They know it's going to be a good investment five or 10 years down the road,'' Zandi said. ``The fundamentals are good: supply constrained markets with lots of population growth, a solid and diversified economy and important global links'' in Los Angeles and San Francisco, he said.

`Bidding War'

It may take until 2010 for foreclosure sales to work their way out of the system in areas where defaults have soared, said Thornberg of Beacon Economics.

``Those sales are going to have a very large impact on prices for the next year or so until those homes get absorbed by the market,'' he said. ``Housing markets don't bounce, they splat. They hit bottom and they stay there.''

That's good news for buyers like Peggy Thorpe. She outbid seven offers for a foreclosed house in Vallejo, east of San Francisco, and still got a 34 percent discount. It was the sixth time since May she made an offer for a home in foreclosure.

``This time I jumped higher,'' said Thorpe, 43, who works at a vineyard in Napa and paid $190,500 for the three-bedroom home with a loan balance of $289,000. ``There's an extreme bidding war right now.''

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=aAL047pyn7t4&refer=home

[Driven1]

``Half off in a decent neighborhood is close to the bottom,'' said Bill Gross, co-chief investment officer of Newport Beach, California-based Pacific Investment Management Co., manager of the world's biggest bond fund. Property markdowns of 30 percent to 40 percent give the market ``price illumination if not sunshine,'' he said.

Gross is actually a man I respect.

[thelakelander]

Economists: Florida Officially In Recession

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: Friday, August 1, 2008 at 7:26 a.m.
Last Modified: Friday, August 1, 2008 at 2:26 p.m.
Economists from the Wachovia Economics Group say that Florida is officially in a recession.


In a report released Thursday, Wachovia analysts said Florida’s economy declined at its sharpest rate in 16 years during 2008’s second quarter.

Analysts predict that the state will lose momentum through 2008, then bottom out late this year or in early 2009.

There is one bright spot. Tourism has held up well, the report says, with the number of visitors to the state up 3.4 percent.

http://www.theledger.com/article/20080801/NEWS/775555273/1410&title=Economists___Florida_Officially_In_Recession

[RiversideGator]

Wachovia said it.  Now it's official.   

[RiversideGator]

This article states that the declines have not been as bad as advertised nationally (outside the bubble regions) based on a new reading of the stats:

Housing Collapse Ahead?
Not According to the Data
   
By Charles W. Calomiris, Stanley D. Longhofer and William Miles
Monday, August 4, 2008; Page A11

Turmoil in the housing market has led to fears that home prices will drop precipitously, particularly if foreclosures force large numbers of homes onto the market in the coming year. Recently, these fears have driven financial stocks down and led to the government rescue of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. But the projected losses have been wildly exaggerated. Most Americans have not experienced any significant decline in the value of their homes -- nor are they likely to.

Only four states -- Arizona, California, Florida and Nevada -- have had declines of more than 4 percent in home prices over the past year, according to the house price index of the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight. Some worry that OFHEO's index may be missing the full extent of the crisis because it doesn't include very high-priced homes with "jumbo" mortgages or homes bought with subprime loans -- the ones being hit hardest. While one could argue that the index would be more representative if it included these transactions, the properties it does include represent more than three-quarters of U.S. homes.

The OFHEO index provides broad coverage of large and small markets across the country, and each home is weighted equally. Furthermore, excluding subprime mortgages has an advantage -- doing so makes the index a more representative measure of the homes owned by middle-class families. Fire-sale prices from distressed sales of subprime mortgages exaggerate the declines that patient sellers are likely to experience.
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This spring, it was much reported that the Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller housing price index recorded a 14.1 percent decline from March 2007 to March 2008, and there is every indication that the index's June results will also be down significantly. But this is a poor measure of what is happening to the value of most homes. The Case-Shiller index includes no data from 13 states (representing 11 percent of the U.S. housing stock) and offers only partial coverage of 29 others (with 79 percent of U.S. housing). Homes in the areas omitted or incompletely covered appreciated at a slower pace during the housing boom, and their values have been more resilient over the past two years, so the data behind the index are biased toward the markets most susceptible to dramatic swings.

Also, the Case-Shiller index weights transactions by value. For example, it gives eight times as much weight to the sale of an $800,000 home as it does to a $100,000 home, meaning it is particularly sensitive to what is happening with high-priced homes in the largest, most expensive markets.

But even if price declines have been small so far, how can one gauge whether the increase in foreclosures will lead to accelerating decline? In our own research, we use quarterly historical (1981-2007) state-level data on the OFHEO price index, foreclosures, home sales, permits and employment to explore how foreclosure shocks affect future home prices.

We conclude that declines in house prices are highly likely to remain small. Our analysis reveals, unsurprisingly, that foreclosures and home prices have negative effects on each other over time, but this does not imply a vicious cycle of collapsing prices. Our models predict that as foreclosures continue to climb in many states, house prices will remain flat or decline in those states -- but will not collapse.

One reason for this is that the effect of foreclosure shocks on house prices is small. Furthermore, other fundamental factors (such as employment growth and a slowing of the growth of the housing supply over the past year and a half) will cushion the impact of foreclosures.

We constructed several forecasting models. Even under an extreme worst-case scenario for foreclosures, our conclusion was that U.S. house prices just aren't going to fall by very much in the next two years. In our worst-case scenario, the average cumulative decline is about 5 percent, and only 12 states experience declines greater than 6 percent by the end of 2009.

The fact that home prices will remain stable does not imply that the housing downturn has been trivial. Indeed, the price stickiness has been reflected in the lower sales volumes and declining housing starts that we have witnessed for over a year. These factors have already slowed GDP growth. Many developers and financial institutions have been badly hurt. And some homeowners who had the misfortune to buy in the hottest markets have experienced significant declines in value and will experience further declines.

But fears of a huge loss in home values for most homeowners -- and especially for middle-income homeowners -- across the United States, and fears of the devastating losses by financial institutions that would accompany them, are greatly overblown.

Charles W. Calomiris is Henry Kaufman professor of financial institutions at Columbia University and a visiting research fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. Stanley D. Longhofer directs the Center for Real Estate at Wichita State University's business school. William Miles is an associate professor of economics and Barton fellow at Wichita State.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/03/AR2008080301572.html

[RiversideGator]

Pending sales up in June:

Pending home sales rise 5.3 percent

By ALAN ZIBEL

WASHINGTON -A measurement of pending home sales rose in June in a rare piece of positive news for the beleaguered market.

The National Association of Realtors' seasonally adjusted index of pending sales for existing homes rose 5.3 percent to 89 from May's reading, which was revised downward to 84.5 from an earlier reading of 84.7.

The June index was 12 percent below year-ago levels.

Home sales are considered pending when the seller has accepted an offer, but the deal has not yet closed. Typically there is a one- to two-month lag before a sale is completed.

Wall Street economists surveyed by Thomson/IFR had predicted the index would fall to 84.3. The index, which sunk to a record low of 83 in March, stood at 101.4 in June 2007. A reading of 100 is equal to the average level of sales activity in 2001, when the index started.

Last month, the Realtor group said completed sales of existing homes fell more sharply than expected in June, pushing activity down to the lowest level in more than a decade. Many analysts predict home prices will keep falling until at least next spring as tighter credit, a weaker job market and rising foreclosures scare potential buyers away.

Still, the NAR predicts a package of housing legislation signed by President Bush last week _ particularly a $7,500 tax credit for first-time homebuyers  will aid a recovery.

"With a tax credit now available to first-time home buyers, increases in home sales could be sustained with the momentum carrying into 2009," Lawrence Yun, the group's chief economist, said in a statement.

Others are less optimistic about a market embroiled in its worst downturn in decades. Richard Syron, chief executive of mortgage finance company Freddie Mac said Wednesday he expects home prices nationwide to fall 18 percent from peak to trough, according to their measure, and that the market is only halfway through the descent.

http://money.aol.com/news/articles/_a/bbdp/pending-home-sales-rise-53-percent/35336

[RiversideGator]

First Coast real estate is leading the way to recovery according to new data in this article:

First Coast homes make a slow climb

A Realtors report shows prices are rebounding

By David Bauerlein, The Times-Union

The median price of existing Jacksonville-area homes rose for sales between April and June, according to figures released Thursday by the Florida Association of Realtors. 

The median sales price of single-family homes sold by Realtors was $191,700, which was 3.5 percent higher than the $185,300 posted for the first three months of the year. The report is one of many used by analysts to track the state of the housing market and forecast whether falling home prices have bottomed out.

"Across the state, we're seeing positive signs," Florida Association of Realtors President Chuck Bonfiglio said. He said prices "appear to be reaching equilibrium in many areas."

Wayne Archer, director of the University of Florida's Bergstrom Center for Real Estate Studies, said spring 2009 could see an upward trend in the state's real estate market.

"I would expect that Jacksonville might quietly lead the recovery," he said. "Jacksonville did not have the same price run-up that South and Central Florida did and as a result did not get caught up in the hysteria."

The median is the price at which half the home sold for more, and half for less. Compared to the second quarter of 2007, the median price was down by 8 percent, and Realtors handled 24 percent fewer sales.

Ray Rodriguez, owner of Real Estate Strategy Center of Northeast Florida, said his own tracking of single-family home sale prices also showed improvement for the second quarter. He said the impact of more foreclosed homes being sold could weigh down prices in the future, but prices appear to have stabilized.

"Going forward, maybe a moderate recovery, but not a drastic downturn," he said.

Statewide, the median sales price for existing single-family homes was $203,000 compared with $202,300 in the first quarter of the year. Compared to the second quarter of 2007, the sale price was 16 percent less.

david.bauerlein@jacksonville.com, (904) 359-4581

http://www.jacksonville.com/tu-online/stories/081508/bus_318833920.shtml

[RiversideGator]

Existing Home Sales jump 5.5%:

U.S. Economy: Home Resales Rose More Than Forecast in September

By Bob Willis

Oct. 24 (Bloomberg) -- Home resales in the U.S. rose more than forecast in September, aided by foreclosure-driven declines in prices that indicated the market was stabilizing before the latest slump in financial markets.

Purchases of existing homes jumped 5.5 percent last month to a 5.18 million annual pace, the highest level in a year, the National Association of Realtors said today in Washington. The median price dropped 9 percent.

Economists said sales figures for this month and next will be critical in determining whether sales have reached a bottom as predicted by the Realtors' group. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke earlier this month said even households with ``good credit'' were finding it tough to get mortgages.

``This may be a temporary bump as we clear out these foreclosed properties,'' said Adam York, an economist at Wachovia Corp. in Charlotte, North Carolina. ``As the meltdown really hits these figures in late October and November, that's when we could see some retracement.''

Resales were forecast to rise to a 4.95 million annual rate from a 4.91 million pace in August, according to the median estimate of 66 economists in a Bloomberg News survey. Projections ranged from 4.7 million to 5.11 million.

Sales rose 1.4 percent compared with a year earlier, the first year-over-year increase since November 2005. Resales totaled 5.65 million in 2007.

Today's figures compare with the 4.86 million level reached in June, the lowest in a decade and 33 percent down from the record reached in September 2005.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aiJJHzH_CPLY&refer=home

[RiversideGator]

From First Trust, based on the National Association of Realtors release today:

1. Existing home sales increased 5.5% in September to an annual rate of 5.18 million, much higher than the consensus expected selling rate of 4.95 million. Existing home sales are up 1.4% versus a year ago.

2. The median price of an existing home declined to $191,600 in September (not seasonally adjusted) and is down 9.0% versus a year ago. Single-family home prices are down 8.6% versus last year.

3. The months’ supply of existing homes (at the current sales rate) fell to 9.9 in September from 10.6 in August.

Implications: The housing market is healing. The key implication of today’s report on existing homes is that credit-worthy home buyers are able get loans. After hovering for twelve months in a range between 4.85 million and 5.11 million, existing home sales spiked up 5.5% in September to a 5.18 million annual rate. The monthly gain in September was the most in five years and the level of sales is now above where it was a year ago (see chart above), the first time that has happened since 2005.

Sales are rising as home sellers (including lenders who have foreclosed on previous owners) are cutting prices aggressively. The median sales price on an existing home is down 9% versus last year and the lowest since 2004. We expect further price declines in the year ahead as the industry continues to work off excess inventory. After hitting 11.0 in June â€" the highest level since 1985 â€" the months’ supply of single-family existing homes has fallen to 9.4.

http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2008/10/some-healing-in-housing-market.html

[uptowngirl]

Good news indeed!