[extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2)

[Brent Neal]

On Nov 26, 2006, at 15:26, Al Brooks wrote:

> does anyone have a hint as to the forecast for real estate? How  
> long ought one wait on receding home prices to buy?


What I'm seeing in the consensus estimates is that a correction of  
10-20% is likely, lasting around 18 months (although some sites have  
tossed out the number of 3.5 years as 'typical' for these corrective  
cycles.

There are a couple of articles I've read (there's one in particular  
I'll try to find to send) that point out that in order for housing to  
reach "historical affordability levels" (i.e., return to some  
arbitrarily chosen growth curve) that the correction would have to be  
around 30%.  This article was sort of interesting in that they also  
chose to point out some ameliorating and otherwise optimistic  
assumptions being used by most of the "consensus" reports, and goes  
in with a deliberate bias towards choosing more pessimistic outcomes  
in order to get a worst-case-esque scenario.

B


--
Brent Neal
Geek of all Trades
http://brentn.freeshell.org

"Specialization is for insects" -- Robert A. Heinlein