The housing market & the economy

Why do we need to revive it? The housing “market” will revive when enough people who need homes decide to buy homes. No need to force the issue.

“Market” is in scare quotes because the terminology we’ve chosen is perverse, as if trafficking in homes, dwellings for families, were the same as exchanging a few bills for a cheeseburger.

Abandon it. A house is a place to live in; it’s not an investment. If you buy a house as an investment, you need to face the possibility of taking a loss. We need to have a massive re(de)valuation of housing prices.

“Does anyone have any ideas for reviving the housing market?”

Cut prices in half.

Agree with Cincy#1
“Why do we need to revive it? The housing “market” will revive when enough people who need homes decide to buy homes. No need to force the issue.”

@2

I was having an online discussion sometime over a year ago about strategic defaults. I couldn’t understand why a person was willing to pay $300K for a house, but then when it was appraised for less money, they just walked away. I mean they still needed a place to live. It was still the same house, and most importantly, they still had their jobs and could pay the payments, so why default? Anyway, then someone explained to me that they really just wanted to flip it for profit. They bought a house for $300K no money down, interest only loan, figuring it would go up to say $375K and they would sell etc. When the market crashed, and it was suddenly worth $225, and they were underwater $75K, they just walked away. They never wanted the house in the first place. They just wanted to ride the bubble.

I mean a home is an investment sort of. You maintain it and it serves you well and if need be it can be sold and retain its value. But, like education, some want it to be a guarantee of easy money.

The housing market has crashed because of our earlier efforts to “revive” it. Our government has artificially propped it up with tax deductions, credits, and Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac, agencies which provided a ready and guaranteed market for low or no down payment mortgages at favorable rates. That was the genesis of the 2008 crash. To again intervene in the housing market would be to set the cycle again for another crash.

Housing prices are now at about 2000 levels, which were sharply higher than 1990 levels. If you draw the housing price curve back over a few decades, you will find that in many areas of the country housing inflation still exceeds general inflation.

No intervention, please! Let the market take its course, and let our kids be able to buy affordable houses. Treat a house as a home, not an investment. We will be much better off in the long run.

Get the government’s grubby hands out of the “housing market.” It’s none of their beeswax. All the government can do is screw things up worse.

I know of many people who, although they can afford their mortgage, have applied for loan modifications because the value of their home has dropped. Banks in our area have taken to visiting the homes of those who apply for modifications because they have found many people applying for modifications for their vacation homes.

I say let the market do what its going to do.

@6 Don’t you think that the housing market crashed because it never really existed in the first place? I mean real market demand in the classic sense of customers willing and able to pay. They were giving folks easy terms that they could afford in order to gin up demand. Without that there was no increasing demand. There was not a growing market of customers willing and able to pay. I don’t see that there is going to be a market of folks willing and able to pay. Where would they come from?

sg @ 9: Good questions. There is a natural market for housing, obviously. People need shelter, and will purchase or rent it at a certain market price point, which is related to some affordable percentage of their income. There are two components to the price of a home that is purchased — the principal price paid, and the interest rate on the mortgage. These two factors, together, determine the monthly “nut”, which is the way a family determines whether they can afford the home.

You are correct that the demand for single family homes was inflated by government intervention — subsidized interest rates (because of a guaranteed market for mortgage securities) and extremely low down payments. If people had to put 20% down, as in the old days, and pay market interest rates, the market demand would have been much smaller. Fewer single family houses would have been built, in favor of more affordable multi-family homes, and we wouldn’t have such a glut of big homes now. But, because of the market intervention, and artificially high demand, a mindset that real estate was the best investment took hold, artificially inflating prices and thus creating another cycle of speculative purchasing, until the whole thing inevitably collapsed.

Eventually, if we stay out of the way and let things sort out, the real market for housing will emerge, and it will be more healthy. It will take years, and will require a more realistic housing mix that is legitimately affordable without subsidy. Many larger homes will rot, empty or sold at fire sale. But it’s a necessary component to re-establishing a healthy market, and we need to permit it to happen.

Another factor in the housing crisis is the aging of the baby boom generation, and their desire to downsize into smaller, upscale housing. Big family homes will decline in value for a generation because of this passing bubble.

At one point in the 80’s the “awlbidness” created a local panic in Texas. A good many houses were worth less than was paid for them. You could buy a new house in the same subdivision for less than the owners had sunk in one several years old.
Some, who had lost their jobs, had to walk away. In those days, you didn’t do that lightly; it messed up your credit and everything else.
And you lost the considerable down payment you’d had to make.
If your job had survived, you could ride it out till prices righted themselves.
More recently, a lot of houses were sold, with the government’s cooperation, to people who were essentially renters w/o even a deposit to lose. Why wouldn’t they walk away when they couldn’t afford the “rent”?
A lot more were speculation: one guy in California was trying to claim nine “homes” and I don’t think he lived in any of them.
The government made the housing boom and bust; you and I paid for it.

If somebody wants to help with the housing market they can buy my house in Florida, it’s on sale for a fraction of what we paid.

People need shelter, and will purchase or rent it at a certain market price point, which is related to some affordable percentage of their income. There are two components to the price of a home that is purchased — the principal price paid, and the interest rate on the mortgage.

Don’t forget property taxes.

When the principal and interest are about half of the monthly payment and the other half is property tax, it is not possible to run up prices like it is in states like California that have relatively low property tax because they rely more on their income tax for revenue.

If the house payment is $1400 and half of that is property tax, any increase in the value/sale price of the property increases interest and tax that must be paid. In California the tax portion is less, so more can go to the seller/investor and the mortgage lender.

The big advantage to property tax is that it is so hard to evade. Renters pay through their rent and the government can confiscate and sell the property to collect. Folks in working in the cash economy cannot easily avoid property and sales taxes like they can income taxes.

I read one guy who thought it appropriate to tax property for revenue because government is charged with protecting property not income. Interesting idea.

sg @ 13: Yep, property tax is another component affecting the market price of real property, to be sure. It’s part of the monthly “nut”, along with property insurance.

I would much prefer something like a property tax to income tax. It IS hard to evade, and it does capture something from everyone, which is healthy for the system. It also keeps Big Brother out of our private financial affairs, thus respecting the 4th Amendment.

@14 “[Property tax] also keeps Big Brother out of our private financial affairs, thus respecting the 4th Amendment.” Paranoid Much?

# 12- you sound ‘needy’-
how about getting one of the do good non-profits to ‘help’ you out—

Life – Liberty – Property- original wording —
Founders knew all about oppressive govt (royals) confiscating Property at will—
We Christians- have not been awake–
Hopefully – now we are…
C-CS

I was told by a representative of a small business lobby group that in the Obamacare bill is a provision that requires a 3.8% sales tax on the sale of your home. If true, that’ll really help the housing market wouldn’t you say? It would seem like a dubious connection to healthcare as well. Anyone here know anything about this?

“I would much prefer something like a property tax to income tax.”

Actually income tax is more fair in theory because it only taxes money that you actually have. So, when you are unemployed, you get a break. Also, if you are subsistence farming, even for a short time, you get a break. The problem is that it only works when folks are pretty honest. In a low trust society with widespread fraud, such as the phase we have been entering, it turns into a de facto penalty on the honest and reward for, uh, the others.

Theoretically, the only fair tax is one I don’t have to pay.

sg @ 18: Maybe an income tax is more fair in theory. At least at first blush. But not when you think about it a while. They lead to class warfare and envy politics, appealing to the worst of human nature, and isolating many citizens from the real costs of government. A large pool of lower income people effectively hold a smaller pool of higher income people hostage through greater and greater marginal tax rates, reaping goodies for themselves on the backs of their neighbors. Highly graduated income taxes also inhibit new wealth. Old wealth is exempt from taxation, being passed down through the generations in ways that avoid taxation. But younger people, or those not born into moneyed families, because of prohibitive tax rates on income, rather than wealth, have little hope of being able to accumulate significant wealth, and thus far less incentive to work hard and create jobs. Productive, taxable investments, which produce jobs, are disfavored, while unproductive non-taxable investments (government bonds) are favored. This does not lead to economic growth.

Worse yet, complex income tax systems require voluntary compliance, which is difficult to enforce. As the systems become more “progressive”, tax avoidance and evasion increases, especially if the wealthy feel the system is unfair to them. To be at all effective, government enforcement must be vigorous, meaning severe warrantless intrusions into the most intimate financial details of the citizenry, in direct contravention to the supposed protections of the 4th Amendment. The costs of compliance with this kind of system are also extreme and a drag on the economy.

So, no, I can’t think of to recommend an income tax system — at least a highly progressive, complex one. Property and consumption taxes, or perhaps even some kind of wealth tax, in combination with consumption taxes (so that savers aren’t penalized over spenders) would be far better and fairer.

Like others note, if you want a healthy housing market, you’ve got to get government out of it. Stop subsidizing loans for poor credit risks, and it’ll stabilize within a year or two, just like it used to.

“Stop subsidizing loans for poor credit risks,”

Then there won’t be any demand, or at least not what house sellers would call a healthy market.

sg; there will be as people learn that there is a bill to pay for not paying your bills, no?

And yes, house sellers call a “healthy market” one where nonproductive assets increase in real value each year, but since when is that related to reality?

A sale of a home requires ” a willing seller and a willing buyer” no more no less. Motives behind selling and buying are irrelevant in a discussion about market laws. Right now the government owns a great percent of the default loans and has allowed some people to stay in their homes. While this is a noble decision, the market cannot react accordingly when there is someone outside the arena artificially causing home prices to be stagnant (+/-). There are investors like I once was who valued rental property not so I could be “stinking rich” , but needed some retirement income. We always kept our homes just as if we were living there and required our renters to do the same. The housing industry, of which I am a part, is probably the greatest fuel to our economy and until it recovers we will see this economy scuffle along for a long time. (sorry Mr. President roads and bridges won’t do) The direct employment of people building homes, offices, malls etc. is huge. Then add all the suppliers and their employees, then the transportation. If we let the home industry fade what will all these people do? McDonalds? Wallmart? I’ve invested my entire adult life (40yrs) to my “vocation”, yes vocation…a calling. I know that God is sovereign but it doesn’t make this time any easier. Please stop characterizing buyers and sellers and those whose jobs (or lack thereof) in the industry as being anything other than being created in the image of God.

Also related to the housing market, but hardly ever mentioned is that the cisis has impacted almost everyone who owns a home- even if they are not upside down on their mortgage. Those who have lost equity (everyone) have also lost a ready fund of disposable cash, or have saw it shrink considerably, in the form of the amount of a home equity loan they can qualify for. The full impact of this has yet to hit the economy. This is another big part of why consumer spending is down and will continue to be; things are getting worse, maybe much so, before they any get better.