OK, I'm tired of all the media reports saying "Foreclosure rates are up 200% over last year" blah blah blah! Here's a statistic you can be proud of. 97% of all homeowners in the United States are current on their mortgage. NINTY SEVEN PERCENT!
Are there homeowners losing their homes? Yes. Are there more this year than there were last year? Yes. Is it in epidemic proportions? NO!
Why do the media continue to report the bad news? And why do they tend to make the statistics seem so bad? Because you watch, read or listen to it.
In the last 5 years of the housig boom, there were some poor decisions made, absolutely there were. The lenders and yes even the real estate agents helped people get into homes they likely would not be able to afford later when their teaser rate expired, or their ARM adjusted. Despite warnings of "Now you know in 3 years your mortgage payment is going to jump by $400/month right? You're going to HAVE to do something by then, either sell, refinance, or simply make more money. You're comfortable with that?" The buyer's just wanted the home so badly they threw caution to the wind and a lot of them are losing their homes now.
But the reality is that this is a correction. The stock market corrects all the time. We tend to correct every 5 - 10 years in real estate. There is no real estate bubble that's going to burst. Unlike the Dot Com bubble popping a few years ago, there is actually a comodity behind real estate. When someone loses their home, the home does not disappear. It's picked up by someone else. So will we see prices drop around the country? Maybe. The long and the short of it folks is that if you never sell, you never lose. You always have a home to come back to.
Are you in the 97%? Congratulations! You're normal.
Fathom Realty West Sound - Poulsbo, WA
Your Kitsap County WA Real Estate Broker
God forbid that there should ever be anything positive, encouraging, or normal in the news these days!
Oct 12, 2007 07:43 AM
Anonymous
After the drought come the rains and the wilderbeest masses of the Okovango River in Africa head in the direction of the lush grasses on the other side of the water. Crocs, lions, hienas, and assorted vultures congregate at the fords and feast on the abundant parade. The predators consume the old and the weak, but the beest gets stronger and faster.
Speculators, flippers, quick buck artists gather at the water when the rates are low and the funds abund. The media is one of the predators, but it does more damage than the ordinary meat eater because it has political motive. It can MAKE news, it can take a mole hill and turn it into Matterhorn.
The weak always fall, but at the crossing it'll look like a slaughter, and the media will blow it even further out of proportion. But the wilderbeest moves on and thrives.
Nature at its best.
Oct 13, 2007 04:31 AM
#2
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