Interesting Article About Market in South Florida

[2bohemians]

Home buyers find bargains as downturn lingers in South Florida


Buyers find many bargains as two-year downturn lingers in South Florida
By Paul Owers |South Florida Sun-Sentinel October 27, 2007



For almost two years, South Florida's housing market has been decidedly dreadful for sellers.

Sales and prices are down, inventory and foreclosures are up, and experts predict more misery for another year.

But there is a bright side. Buyers are getting deals, if not outright steals, as sellers, banks and builders cope with the downturn. Savvy buyers are spending tens of thousands of dollars less now than they were during the boom years of 2000 to 2005. They're paying reduced closing costs or avoiding them altogether and scoring freebies such as plasma TVs, granite countertops and even a year's worth of homeowner fees or property taxes ... Click here for the full article

[SHELLY]

Compare and contrast to this article about the South Florida market that appeared in the NY Times, March 25, 2005:

Trading Places: Real Estate Instead of Dot-Coms

Real estate-crazed Americans have started behaving in ways that eerily recall the stock market obsession of the late 1990's.

In Naples, Fla., some houses have been bought twice in a single day, an early-21st-century version of day trading. Buying stocks on margin has morphed into buying homes with no money down. The over-the-top parties of Internet start-ups have been replaced by flashy gatherings where developers pitch condos to eager buyers.

Premonitions of a bubble on the verge of popping do not ruffle those who are bullish on real estate. In Miami, Ron Shuffield, president of Esslinger-Wooten-Maxwell Realtors, predicted that a limited supply of land coupled with demand from baby boomers and foreigners would prolong the boom indefinitely.

"South Florida," he said, "is working off of a totally new economic model than any of us have ever experienced in the past."

The can't-miss aura of real estate has also helped nudge many families to invest more of their personal wealth in real estate by buying more expensive homes and taking on riskier mortgages - much as ordinary workers used their 401(k) plans to bet on company stocks.

There are certainly serious reasons to believe that house prices will not suffer the fate of technology stocks. Not only are houses more tangible, but people do not sell their homes as quickly as stocks, making a panic much less likely. Because of tax advantages, few owners are likely to sell and rent something else simply because local house prices start to decline.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/25/bu...=1&oref=slogin

[flyguy]

"South Florida," he said, "is working off of a totally new economic model than any of us have ever experienced in the past."


Note to self. Whenever you hear this phrase, sell!

Flyguy

[Babyblue]

Compare and contrast to this article about the South Florida market that appeared in the NY Times, March 25, 2005:

Trading Places: Real Estate Instead of Dot-Coms

Real estate-crazed Americans have started behaving in ways that eerily recall the stock market obsession of the late 1990's.

In Naples, Fla., some houses have been bought twice in a single day, an early-21st-century version of day trading. Buying stocks on margin has morphed into buying homes with no money down. The over-the-top parties of Internet start-ups have been replaced by flashy gatherings where developers pitch condos to eager buyers.

Premonitions of a bubble on the verge of popping do not ruffle those who are bullish on real estate. In Miami, Ron Shuffield, president of Esslinger-Wooten-Maxwell Realtors, predicted that a limited supply of land coupled with demand from baby boomers and foreigners would prolong the boom indefinitely.

"South Florida," he said, "is working off of a totally new economic model than any of us have ever experienced in the past."

The can't-miss aura of real estate has also helped nudge many families to invest more of their personal wealth in real estate by buying more expensive homes and taking on riskier mortgages - much as ordinary workers used their 401(k) plans to bet on company stocks.

There are certainly serious reasons to believe that house prices will not suffer the fate of technology stocks. Not only are houses more tangible, but people do not sell their homes as quickly as stocks, making a panic much less likely. Because of tax advantages, few owners are likely to sell and rent something else simply because local house prices start to decline.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/25/bu...=1&oref=slogin

I wonder what the burn ratio to cash was? The more you lost the more you gained, for stocks of course.