Mahoning Valley Ohio
Market Report

Youngstown, Boardman, Canfield, Poland, Austintown
and surrounding Ohio communities in
Trumbull, Mahoning, and Columbiana Counties.

Bad News for the DOW . . .
Good News for Real Estate?

Last week the news media was all a-buzz about the poor performance of the DOW which lost about 500 points overall. Time and again reference was made to "Black Friday" 20 years ago, almost to the day, when the DOW lost over 500 points in a single day, and over 22% of it's value. What they didn't tell you was the DOW today would have to lose well over 3,000 points to reach a loss of that same magnitude.

Yes, the stock market did lose some ground, but that's GOOD news for home buyers and real estate investors; because as money moves out of the stock market it moves into bonds - and bond prices move up. As bond prices increase the "yield" on those bond decreases. And guess what?  It's the yield on bonds, especially our treasury bonds, that determines our interest rates. As yields fall, so do interest rates and last week they moved down by about 0.25%.

Complicated? Not really. Just remember that bad news for the DOW most often is good new for interest rates. Is it time to take advantage of interest rates that despite all the negativity remain at historically low levels? In the Mahoning Valley - in my opinion, it's never been better.