Hope seen, despite home sales downturn

Realtors say home resales fell 3% in March, but analysts point to signs of a stabilizing market.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Sales of existing homes fell in March, according to an industry report released Thursday, but analysts say the housing market is showing signs of stabilization.

The National Association of Realtors said that existing home sales fell last month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.57 million units, 3% lower than the downwardly revised rate of 4.71 million in February.

March sales were down 7.1% year over year, and came in weaker than the 4.65 million rate forecast by analysts surveyed by Briefing.com.

Despite last month's decline, existing home sales appear to be stabilizing, according to Ian Shepherdson, economist at High Frequency Economics.

"Sales are volatile month-to-month, but the trend appears to be flattening off," Shepherdson said in a research note.

Single family home sales, which are considered the core of the market, fell at a 10% annualized rate in the first quarter of 2009, after a 17.4% drop in the last three months of 2008. At the current sales pace, existing-home sales will be down "only" 2% in the second quarter, according to Shepherdson.

First-time buyers made up 53% of existing home sales in March. Charles McMillan, NAR's president, said first-time buyers are "crucial" to a recovery in the overall housing market.

"The housing market always heals from the bottom up, and with large numbers of first-time buyers entering the market it will become a little easier for sellers to trade up or down," McMillan said in a statement.

Meanwhile, sales of "distressed properties" accounted for over half of all transactions in March. Foreclosed homes typically sell for 20% less than traditional homes, according to NAR.

"Clearly foreclosure activity is driving the marketplace," said Adam York, an economist at Wachovia Economics Group, in a research report. "Buyers are clearly looking for 'bargains,' if they are looking at all."

Existing home sales in the West declined 4.2% in March. Sales in the South and the Northeast also fell, while sales in the Midwest were unchanged.

The national median existing-home price was $175,200 in March, up 4.2% from $168,200 in February. Still, the median existing-home price was down more than 12% since March 2008, when it was $200,100.

The total number of existing homes on the market at the end of March fell 1.6% to 3.74 million units. At the current sales pace, it would take an estimated 9.8 months to sell that inventory of properties. That's up slightly from 9.7 months in February and January.

"The inventory overhang has stabilized too," Shepherdson said. But the number of existing homes on the market remains historically high, and prices will continue to fall rapidly "for the foreseeable future," he said.

First Published: April 23, 2009: 10:06 AM ET
By Ben Rooney, CNNMoney.com staff writer
Last Updated: April 23, 2009: 1:52 PM ET

Beach to Bay Real Estate Center is a full service real estate brokerage servicing buyers, sellers and renters at the Delaware beach areas. We handle all forms of real estate, including residential, commercial, and lots and land, in addition to bank owned, short sales and auctioned properties and representation; mortgage needs including refinances, new home purchases, second homes, first time homebuyer programs and reverse mortgages; maintain professional relationships with local settlement attorneys, insurance companies, contractors, and inspection companies; and are affiliated with a preservation and restoration company. Beach to Bay services all of Sussex County, and southern Kent County, with a strong focus on the beach resort areas of Rehoboth Beach (19971), Lewes (19958), Bethany Beach (19930), Dewey Beach (19971), Milton (19968), Millsboro (19966) and more.

New home sales show signs of revival

Despite a decline in March, the annual rate remains above what economists expect after an even stronger than originally reported February.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Sales of newly constructed homes are showing indications, ever so slight, that the housing decline may be near an end, a government report showed Friday.

The Commerce Department said new home sales fell 0.6% last month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 356,000. But that was from a rate of 358,000 in February that was revised up from the originally reported at 337,000 -- the level economists were expecting for March.

The net revision to the prior three months equals an increase of 31,000 units, according to Wachovia Economics Group.

"This is clearly a better-than-expected number," said Michael Larson, a real estate analyst at Weiss Research. "Technically, yes, sales declined, but the last three months were revised higher and the raw number came in better than expectations."

"All signs are pointing to stabilization in market conditions, which is due to lower prices," Larson said. "We still have a problem with unemployment, and that's why any rebound we see will be muted."

Another signs of a bottom in the market: The estimated number of new homes for sale at the end of last month was a seasonally adjusted 311,000, according to the Commerce Department. Last month, it was 328,000 unsold homes.

At the current sales pace, it would take 10.7 months to sell through that inventory, according to the report. That's down from the previous month, when the estimated months of inventory was 11.2, and was nearly 2 months below January's level of 12.5.

"While the inventory correction will likely overshoot to the downside, we are getting closer to stability in the marketplace," said Adam York, economist at Wachovia Economics Group, in a research note. He added that new home inventory is now approaching late 1990s levels.

"As we have long said, getting the new home market back into equilibrium is an important precursor to broader housing market improvement," York said.

The median sales price of new houses sold in March was $201,400, down 3.5%from the revised $208,700 in February and 12.1% from March 2008, when it was $229,300.

"Median prices fell for the third straight month as builders fought the rising tide of foreclosure sales for buyers' attention," said York.

As buyers bargain shop for deals on foreclosed properties, homebuilders have drastically scaled back production to meet falling demand.

On Thursday, the National Association of Realtors said sales of existing homes fell 3% in March, after an unexpected rise the month before.

First Published: April 24, 2009: 10:17 AM ET
By Ben Rooney, CNNMoney.com staff writer
Last Updated: April 24, 2009: 11:31 AM ET

Beach to Bay Real Estate Center is a full service real estate brokerage servicing buyers, sellers and renters at the Delaware beach areas. We handle all forms of real estate, including residential, commercial, and lots and land, in addition to bank owned, short sales and auctioned properties and representation; mortgage needs including refinances, new home purchases, second homes, first time homebuyer programs and reverse mortgages; maintain professional relationships with local settlement attorneys, insurance companies, contractors, and inspection companies; and are affiliated with a preservation and restoration company. Beach to Bay services all of Sussex County, and southern Kent County, with a strong focus on the beach resort areas of Rehoboth Beach (19971), Lewes (19958), Bethany Beach (19930), Dewey Beach (19971), Milton (19968), Millsboro (19966) and more.

NAR's Take on the Housing/Obama Stimulus Package

Here's our take on the Stimulis Bill and Treasury announcements made this week. We look at the Stimulis package AND the Treasury's package holistically, in compliment with each other - mostly because that's how the Obama team is looking at it. Your representatives, the NAR Board of Directors, asked us in November to do 4 things (with an unspoken but clearly understood mandate to PRESERVE what we already have). Here they are: 1) get loan limits raised for high cost areas, 2) make the $7,500 tax credit NOT a loan, 3) try to find ways to push interest rates down (which are higher than they should be due to systemic risk right now) by 200 basis points, and 4) help provide solutions to the foreclosure/short sale problem.

So here's what we have achieved: 1) the loan limits will be raised to $727,000 in high cost areas, 2) the tax credit will be raised to $8,000 with NO payback [a true credit], 3) interest rates have come down 125-150 basis points, and 4) the bill has over $50 billion in it for foreclosure mitigation, with Geitners Treasury plan signaling that the second half of TARP and TALF will be used to mitigate foreclosures through a government guarantee, drive down interest rates by buying another $200-300 billion of mortgage paper from the GSES's thereby freeing them up to do the same with new mortgages, and Fannie has just agreed to lift the cap of 4 investment properties eligible for loans and raise it to 10.

In addition, we preserved what we have - which some tend to forget is always on the table when these negotiations start up again - mortgage interest deductability, real estate tax deductability, and the $250,000/$500,000 cap gains exclusion (an overall package worth more than $100 billion and for some a very attractive funding source for their pet projects).

We did make a run at the $15,000 credit -- and we would have loved to have gotten that or the Homebuilders $22,000 credit idea as well as their 5 year loss carryback deal, but they were considered too rich for this program. What it did do though is totally take the debate off of whether a tax credit should be reinstated at all (it expired last year) and whether it was a true credit or a repayable loan, and kept the conversation on how much it should be. It also kept the debate off of 'what we are willing to give up to get a $15,000 tax credit' and kept the debate again, on how much it should be. It's pretty hard to complain when they give you what you ask for and you lose something you never had.

While we study the Treasury specifics on their major role in providing the rest of the housing solution -- there is much more to come and we are working diligently with the Administration to help 'unclog the pipeline' and get capital flowing into housing again.

Housing Market Bottom in Sight

US housing markets from Florida to California have suffered price drops of 50 percent or more from their peak, but now, at long last, a bottom is within sight, likely in the fourth quarter nationally, according to a report from Moody's Economy.com.

By the end of the housing downturn, nearly 62 percent of the nation's 381 metropolitan areas will have experienced double-digit-percent declines in house prices, peak-to-trough, says the report by chief economist Mark Zandi and a team that includes Celia Chen, senior director of housing economics.

The declines will exceed 20 percent in about 100 metro areas, according to the report, scheduled to be discussed in a Webcast on Thursday. An advance copy was given exclusively to Reuters.

Despite the gloomy data, the report, by an independent subsidiary of Moody's, paints an improving picture of the housing market, which is in the midst of its worst downturn since the Great Depression and is both the source and a major casualty of the world credit crisis.

An improvement could portend a turnaround for the world's largest economy and help stanch losses at U.S. banks, hit hard by soured mortgage securities.

"Despite the darkening national economic outlook and the weak conditions in the housing market, some positive signs give hope that a bottom in the housing market is coming into view," the report said.

"More than three years since the market began correcting, inventories are flattening, prices are coming back down to earth, and sales are approaching stability," the report said.

The outlook, however, assumes stronger action by U.S. policymakers and says that even with further government intervention, the recession will keep the housing market from fully recovering until the end of this year.

With this help, sales are probably at bottom, stabilized by foreclosure sales, while construction will hit bottom in the first half of this year, although the pace of housing starts will remain very depressed until 2011.

From the peak to the trough, total single-family home sales will have declined by 40 percent and housing starts by 70 percent.

Zandi's analysis of the impact of the U.S. economic stimulus package has been cited by some of the Obama administration's top advisers.

The Moody's Economy.com report—titled "Housing in Crisis: When Will Metro Markets Recover?"—says home prices in the United States will hit their nadir in the fourth quarter of 2009, with the National Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller Home Price Index expected to show a 36.2 percent peak-to-trough decline.

The peak was reached in the first quarter of 2006.

House prices have fallen in about 70 percent of all metro areas over the past several years and although prices in most metro areas declined modestly during this period, price depreciation from peak exceeded 5 percent in 116 metro areas and exceeded 20 percent in about 50 metro areas.

Those metro areas with the most exposure to subprime and investor lending, which consequently experienced the greatest run-up in prices during the boom, are suffering the greatest declines on the downside of the housing cycle.

Punta Gorda, Florida, is one of the hardest hit U.S. markets.

Its house price declines are expected to reach a bottom in the second quarter of 2010, with a peak-to-trough decline forecast at 65.4 percent.

The peak was reached in the first quarter of 2006.

House price declines in Stockton, California, are expected to reach a nadir in the fourth quarter of 2009, with a peak-to-trough drop forecast at 67.1 percent.

The peak was reached in the first quarter of 2006.

Moody's Economy.com, based in West Chester, Pennsylvania, provides economic research and consulting services to businesses, governments and other institutions.

Reported by Reuters, www.cnbc.com http://www.cnbc.com/id/29028031/

10 Signs to the Bottom of Real Estate Markets

The bottom of each real estate market in America won’t occur with much fanfare. In fact, few people will realize that it’s even happening when they do, and they’re usually only recognized after the bottom has already hit.

The search for the elusive bottom to any real estate market is akin to finding the proverbial needle in a hay stack. Once they’re fully realized, the elevator is usually on the way up and higher prices follow.

Bottoms to real estate markets are a lot like trying to determine when stocks in financial markets are at their lowest price. Veteran investors say it’s a fool’s game to try to find the bottom to make a buying decision because as you wait, study and calculate the tendency is to over analyze as the market makes its own moves and often leaves you in the lurch.
In these increasingly complicated financial times, troubled by the credit crunch finding a market’s elusive bottom is no easy task. But here are 10 signs to ponder on whether the bottom of your market is near:

1- The inventory of listings is reducing as properties come off the market, especially those over priced places that have been sitting on the market rotting. Noticing fewer for sale signs in that neighborhood you’re interested in buying a home or condo in these days?

2- The Mass Media spurs interest with talk of a bottom. Newspapers and television reporters speculate and ask the experts if a bottom is occurring like it’s a national real estate market trend when all markets have their own local bottoms and are scattered over time.

3- Sales volume begins to pick up, slowly at first as pent up buyer demand results in more showings.

4- People are less fearful of the market.

5- People begin to talk about how much money there is to be made investing in real estate again.

6- Increasing telephone calls to realty offices on listings and for sale by owners.

7- The Fed finishes tinkering with interest rates at least for a while, trying to get a handle on how the markets are moving.

8- People commonly talk about the bottom occurring like it’s a thing of the past with increasing consumer confidence.

9- Prices finally seem to stop dropping.

10- Financing becomes easier to obtain.

There aren’t hard and fast rules to insuring that your real estate market is at the bottom. All bottoms are different after all, but one thing’s sure. The bottom of markets have historically been for a much shorter duration than the top, which is one reason why most property owners are secure in their positions. Statistically, very few real estate buyers make their purchases at the bottom or the top. Most buy some where in between.

By Mike Colpitts
http://www.housingpredictor.com/bottom.html