Ryan Frank has an interesting piece on Happy Valley, or "Foreclosure Valley" in the Oregonian today.
One part of the story featres the Andersons, an older couple who speculated on a $600+k house in Happy Valley and lost over $100k. That sounds like less than a 20% loss until you realize that they didn't put any money down, so it's a 100% loss. At least they cut their losses, unlike lots of others out there still holding out hope for a quick rebound.
The best line of the story though was this:
"She says she should have hired her own real estate broker for expert advice. "That was our mistake. My mistake," Aloma says, hanging her head, blinking back tears."
Expert advice? The same Realtors who didn't believe Portland prices would drop? The same Realtors who only get paid on a sale, so of course it's a good time to buy!
No Aloma, your mistake was not looking at reality and realizing that growth had peaked and was declining, that the party was over. But don't beat yourself up too badly, that data was nearly impossible to find in 2006. At least today it's not.
4 comments:
Portland real estate agents as a group should be lined up and flogged.
When has it ever not been a "great time to buy!". Now that there has been talk of the curbing blatant Wall Street investment banking greed, why hasn't there been talk about the RIDICULOUS commissions real-estate agents receive?
Note to Portland real estate agents and sellers: It's not different here in Portland. Have you followed any of the news in the world over the past few months? The strategy to not list so many properties rather than dropping prices in order to reduce bloated inventory isn't going to work. Most of the suckers have bought already and the remaining can't get loans.
The data might not have existed, but the common sense should have - what goes up must come down. As John Mayer says, it's gravity :)
LOL @ Charles flip!
Charles flip? I missed something...
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