As a direct consequence of the credit crisis, the real estate market stumbled thanks to a severe drop in the amount of money that banks were willing to give to potential homeowners. The resulting drop in home prices across the board has now created a buyer’s market, leading to a massive 7.2 percent jump in the number of sales of existing homes in July.
 
The figure comes from the National Association of Realtors, which began keeping track of the statistic in 1999 and has never recorded a monthly increase as large as July’s. According to the report, home sales have picked …read more

While national home prices have fallen again to a level that has not been seen since 2002, there is evidence that the situation may have hit rock bottom and is creeping back upwards for some areas of the country.
According to The Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller National Home Price index, home prices have fallen 19.1 percent in the first quarter compared to last year, 32.2 percent compared to their peak in 2006. The drop from last year to today represents the largest drop in the history of the index.
Home prices vary remarkably from city to city depending on the local economy, foreclosure …read more

According to the National Association of Realtors, the median price of an existing single family home dropped 7.6 percent in the second quarter of 2008.  RealtyTrac, Inc. reported that there were 55 percent more foreclosures filed in July 2008 than the same month last year.
The low median price is partially driven by the fact that approximately one third of all homes sales reported were foreclosures or short sales.
In a WSJ interview, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan projected that the housing market may not begin to stabilize until early 2009 or later.  Greenspan pointed out that the excess supply of housing units is starting …read more