We're entering crazy-land now, as desperate homebuilders throw in yachts and college tuition.
Remember folks, these incentives ARE NOT INCLUDED IN THE BOGUS PRICE NUMBERS REPORTED BY THE NAR AND THE US GOVERNMENT.
Anyone who believes prices haven't crashed just needs to look what's going on with incentives and add their value to the price declines already seen.
And good god, why isn't this illegal? If a bank writes up a $500,000 house, but the home is only with $400,000 after you subtract incentives, aren't they being had?
And you know who's really being had? Anyone who believes the bogus comps and makes a purchase decision based on them. Even Zillow.com is totally worthless, since their comp data also excludes incentives.
When a home alone won't do - Developers tack on unexpected extras like a community yacht or college fund to get noticed.
Prospective new home buyers are learning they don't have to settle for low-dough incentives like granite countertops.
Now available in the Tampa Bay area: college tuition with a new home purchase and a condo-cum-yacht deal.
"I've never seen incentives like this," said Carlos A. Fuentes, president of the Greater Tampa Association of Realtors, who has been in the business for 20 years.
BellaSol, a condo development under construction in Apollo Beach, is using a 50-foot Navigator yacht as the lure for its 81-unit project. Buy a condo, ranging from $450,000 to about $1-million, and get a chance to use the community yacht.
Elsewhere, home builder Taylor Woodrow will contribute $11,000 to the Florida Prepaid College Plan on that buyer's behalf for each new home buyer in the company's six Tampa Bay area developments.
But with inventories bulging - there were more than 17,000 condos, townhomes and single-family homes on the market in Hillsborough County in December, compared with 7,800 a year earlier, things have changed.
February 07, 2007
Tampa Association of Realtors President: "I've never seen incentives like this"
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24 comments:
Carlos Fuentes...what a cool name. Say it out loud in a very Spanish accent you'll see what I mean.
World according to KEIF:
- Zillow is totally worthless.
- NAR data is totally worthless.
- David Lereah is lying.
- The MSM is lying.
- Bernake is full of shit
- Bush is lying
- Hillary is lying
- Democrats are all liars
- Republicans are all liars
Everyone is lying except Keith The Great.
Dude get over yourself already.
New housing only accounts for a small portion of house sales. Existing houses account for the majority. I can see why a condo developer may care about keeping the selling price inflated, they have more of the same condo to sell and they don't want the comps to fall.
Why would your average home seller offer incentives rather than lower the selling price? After all, the lower the selling price, the less taxes and Realtor fees they owe. I seriously doubt that very many sellers of existing homes are offering such incentives. Does anyone have any evidence to the contrary?
And as for the true value of incentives, what is "a chance to use a communal yacht" worth. This sounds like more of a shtick than a valuable incentive.
And one more thing, the bank originating the loan sends its own appraiser to see if the house is worth what they are giving a loan for. How are you pulling one over on the bank if you buy a house for $500,000 and they stick a EE Series US Savings Bond with a face value of $11,000 and an actual value of $5,500 in your kids college fund. If the bank doesn't think the house is worth what they are lending then they wont lend it.
Yes, anon above, all of those parties above are corrupt, wrong and/or liars
Ask yourselves - what do they have to gain by lying.
Exactly: Everything.
What would I have to gain by lying? Exactly: Nothing. HP is a community service, a hobby.
Blogs are allowing the truth to get out. Therefore we are dangerous to the establishment. Blogs are disruptional. Blogs are challenging the new world order. Blogs are changing the way information is disseminated.
And HP is not "keith". HP is a community of concerned people sharing information and opinion. I'm just the host.
Good luck on your job search or home sale.
Carlos Fuentes that dog faced bald headed Cuban marielito realtwhore whos breath smells worse than the afterburn of a vulture's behind.
Mid Hudson Valley, NY
Builder bought a 2 acre lot next door to my house for $150K at the end of 05 (property value in 01 was $32K) at the time he purchased the property he said he was going to split it up into 2 parcels and place 2 $500K homes on them.
so far nothing has been built and another ‘for sale’ sign went up, so i called the RE agency to find out what the deal is, they said 1, 1 acre lot is up for sale for $125K.
saw the builder the other day and asked him how things are going, he said things are slowing down but prices aren’t going down, and asked me if i know of any large land parcels in the area, he is looking to buy now before things pick up, i just said i'll let him know if i hear of something.
but in my mind i was thinking he aught to put down that crack pipe.
this area is gonna crash hard.
KEIF,
I am the anon calling your bullshit on liars. I assume your last sentence is in regards to me being a realtwhore(tm) or an FB? You're wrong on both counts. Along with your assumptins that everyone is a liar you also assume anyone who disagrees with you is an FB or a realtor.
I've been dealing with end of the world nutjobs like you for years. In the 80s the Japanese were going to take over. In the 90s everyone was going to get laid off due to automation and big bad evil computers. Early 2000s everyone's job was going to India. Now in the later 2000s housing will crash and everyone will be left bankrupt along with their job going to China. Oh and wild Mexicans will rape your daughters too.
It's the same alarmist bullshit every time. Only thing that changes is the medium (books/magazines 80s, message boards and talk radio 90s, blogs 2000s) and the cause of the impending doom (Japan 80s, technology 90s, China/India 2000s).
You are the modern day equivalent of the John Birch Society. You have a sizeable following of fellow paranoids and you get a little press here and there. But at the end of the day you are a fringe group that most people ridicule.
Anon: Wednesday, February 07, 2007 5:13:21 PM
apparently you NEVER think for yourself. Like a morphine drip, you just listen to the mainstream gobbly gook and believe all is well.
uhm...he bought two acres for $150K. Now he is selling 1 acre for $125K.
This is a crash how?
If anyone says there area is doing great please provide the zip code so we can check the foreclosures in your area. This will tell the real story. If people opt for foreclosure instead selling and paying off debt then your area is not doing that well.
Hey Anon, anyone can point out fears that never materialized, but one could also point out fears that did materialize.
What would you say to those who predicted that New Orleans would be in a world of hurt if they were to be hit by a hurricane? Would you have called them chicken littles? I am sure people did. How about all of those people who predicted our combustion of fossil fuels would lead to climate change, would you call them chicken littles? You would not have been alone. How about the people who said that the tech stocks were riding too high in 2000 and there would have to be a correction. I bet they were chicken littles.
The truth is that we are in for a world of hurt and we here at HP are expressing our views as to why. Do not make the mistake of believing that anyone who believes something bad will happen is just full of crap because you know what, not everything that happens is good. Catastrophes DO happen and it is best to be prepared.
If you want to call anyone who predicts a downturn an "alarmist" then do so, but I for one base my opinions on the available FACTS.
thinker,
Good point about resales. It makes absolutely no sense for someone to sell for $500K and give away $20K in giveaways as opposed to selling for $480K instead.
New home sale prices are suspect because of incentives. As a seller though tha doesn't mean much. Only resale comps used by appraisers.
It's all much ado about nothing.
New Orleans was predicted by many to be in trouble. Those predictions were based on the fact that a city 9 feet below sea level in a hurricane zone will eventually get hit hard. Simple laws on nature and probability at work there.
Your predictions involve tangled conspiracies between the NAR, Bush, Hillary, Council on Foreign Relations, China, India, Bernake all colluding somehow to make this global depression happen.
New Orleans predictions: credible
HP predcctions: KOO-KOO
Do you see why that is?
If anyone says there area is doing great please provide the zip code so we can check the foreclosures in your area. This will tell the real story. If people opt for foreclosure instead selling and paying off debt then your area is not doing that well.
So by that logic there were no foreclosures 2002-2005 during the boom huh Cletus?
This area ain't slowed down any, 36830
anon said:
uhm...he bought two acres for $150K. Now he is selling 1 acre for $125K.
This is a crash how?
-------------------------------
this is a crash because that 'for Sale' sign will be hanging out there for the next five years.
this builder has missed the boat.
just cause he's asking for an insane overpriced amount does not mean that there are still very many future FBer out there.
although i must admit i like the wind chime effect of that rusty sign in the wind
Every zip code will have some foreclosures at any given point in time. Boom or bust people get sick, get laid off and lose their home.
What matters is are there more foreclosures now than 1 month, 6 months and 12 months ago. The trend, whether negative or positive will tell you how the market is soing, not a snapshot of 1 day's foreclosure numbers.
I don't know if that data is available anywhere, if it is I'd love to see it broken down by zip code.
Anon, my point was that you cannot call someone an alarmist simply because their predictions are dire.
We are not suggesting some grand conspiracy. After all, we are not talking about dark-alley meetings. All of the players are simply acting according to their own self-interest. If you can make a strong case for why things will be ok, please do so. Keith has frequently solicited contrary opinions as they foster debate and reconsideration. However, you did not provide an argument, you simply dismissed our conclusions as being alarmist merely because others have predicted bad situations that have never materialized.
-Thinker
To the Anon whom is trying to
label the Housing Panic blog a
site for end of the world nutjobs:
I am old enough to have heard all
of these end of the world
arguements as well and have
watched them fall apart as the
years go by.
I have also heard the
arguement
'this time it's different'
Well, considering the US is in the
hole to the tune of
$8,699,981,889,152.68
the highest debt ever owed by the
US in all of its history
See the Website for yourself
http://www.publicdebt.treas.gov/opd/opdpdodt.htm
the 'nutjobs' might have a point
or two to make.
Considering that if foreign
investors stopped investing or
buying US Securities
The dollar and the US Economy
would suffer, and suffer hard,
Considering that millions of
Americans are deeply in debt to
their banks for home and car loans,
deeply in debt to their credit
card companies,
the US savings rate is in negative
territory, the lowest since the
dark days of the great deprsssion
Then maybe, just maybe, the
nutjobs might be halfway right
about something being very wrong
with America today.
Even if you choose to ignore all
of this as fearmongering,
you still must ask the question:
What harm does Keith do by raising
the alarm over the excessive
prices of housing?
If he discourages buyers from
buying now, that is not evil, just
prudent on his part since he honestly doesn't want to see anyone bet burned with reverse equity or get trapped in a house
that is losing value as months and
years go by.
It is free advice, take it or
leave it.
Also Anon, perhaps you should make
up a web name to at least identify
yourself instead of just using
anonymous, you seem to be willing
to call others names and condemn
ther ideas from the safety of the
shadows.
Make up a web name for yourself
and stand or fall by your words by
that webname.
Prove to all of us your courage.
Dumped my luxury ghetto townhome one the supposed be all the end all Wilmington DelaSh!thole riverfront for 35k less than I paid PLUS I left behind my appliances valued at 5k. As I was going into the claws of the RE dragon/Bubble of Metro DC and not going to be able to afford a real home for a long time what good would a set of appliances do me? I do see other sellers saying they will leave behind appliances & furniture. It might not be widespread and may be motivated by practicalities on the part of the seller, but hell nowadays anything that sweetens the pot and gets a place sold and does not impact directly on you present bottom line (sunk costs), why not toss it in?
Incentives.....Don't care
LOWER THE PRICE!!!!!!
I would like some comments on this situation: I am a desperate seller asking 500. Will take 400 happily. Have offer for 600 from investor who has never seen house. I pay 200 in commission to investor's broker at closing. This broker has obtained an appraisal for 600, is putting only $5K down, and wants 100% financing.I pay closing costs only on 400 and commission to listing broker on 400. It sounds crazy to me, but it's in my best interest to do this deal to avoid foreclosure. Is it fraud?
So HP'ers. What incentive would it take to have a sane, productive and employed person move to Vegas or good God Florida? The crash is a way of nailing the easy life, chasing some warm weather life by the beach jerks. Its gratifying that many regular folks who work hard and stuck it out in the places with seasons are not going to get whacked. Karma I say and just plain old mean reversion. Many will and and are suffering but I take solace in the fact that those that are getting hit hardest will be flipper and greedy douchebags in Florida and Vegas--both attract the same kind of "people". So tell me--can anyone name any great Floridians other that say Burt Reynolds? $th largest state and it has produced nobody of note on the global or national scene. O.k. you get Gloria Estefan but thats a stretch. Sorry for the hardworking folks, but flipper and greedsters its your time!
When the bank forecloses on the house, who gets to keep the yacht and college fund?
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