US Housing starts drop 17.6%

[:) Smiley]

Where's your data from?

This is the chart from this week's AIA online newsletter, which gives a completely different picture.

http://www.aia.org/aiarchitect/thisweek05/tw0415/0415otb.htm

Another factor not mentioned above but existent is that some people choose to renovate rather than demolish and rebuild.

[Dis]

where I live housing is overpriced. Many people cannot afford to live in a house (myself included).

It costs about $300,000 to buy an average house where I live. Yes you californians will laugh, but your income is much higher. Our income is the same as it was when housing costed $120,000.

[Kidlicious]

Re: US Housing starts drop 17.6%

Originally posted by pchang
What does this mean?

I think it means the economy isn't so hot right now.

[Ben Kenobi]

This is bad news. Our mills are doing well with the housing starts in the US continuing to rise. This is why they have so far prospered even through the new tariff and our high dollar.

[Ben Kenobi]

Overpriced? Vancouver has some crazy prices for a small house on the west side. 800K CDN!

What's going to happen when all the young people, like me, simply refuse to pay those kinds of prices?

[Provost Harrison]

The slide in prices is going on in London albeit slowly...I am positioning myself to take advantage of this situation in a few years time...

[:) Smiley]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Overpriced? Vancouver has some crazy prices for a small house on the west side. 800K CDN!

What's going to happen when all the young people, like me, simply refuse to pay those kinds of prices?

It simply means that young people will have to live in smaller houses, apartments, or elsewhere. There are plenty of older people with the cash.

[Dinner]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
What's going to happen when all the young people, like me, simply refuse to pay those kinds of prices?

You'll become homeless? Either that or you will spend your entire life as a renter never earning equity.

[Lancer]

"What's going to happen when all the young people, like me, simply refuse to pay those kinds of prices?"

Get a used RV. Move from supermarket to supermarket to park at night or stay where you work with your employer's permittion. Get water at any friend's outside spicket. Get rid of waste at a highway dump site. Save all you make except food and gas costs. In 10 years move to the Philippines and live like a king.

Always go used RV shopping in the rain so you know if the roof leaks.

If prices drop like a rock you'll be well positioned to take advantage of the situation. If not, you'll be enjoying tropical breezes before you know it.

[Zkribbler]

Traditionally, houses have sold for 100 times the monthly rental. Prices in L.A. are up to about 400 times the monthly rental.

One real estate expert I talked to says that bubbles in residential real estate markets don't act like normal bubbles. When the dot.com bubble burst, the market tanked as people tried to dump their stock. By with RE, especially residences, people tend to hold on to their homes and ride the bubbles down, so any decrease in price tends to be both slower and smaller.

[:) Smiley]

Actually, I think both my data and Pchang's data are correct- those architects hired three months ago are for houses that have not yet started construction.

So, nothing to worry about- things are heading up.

[Dracon II]

Australia has been in a similar condition re: housing bubble. Seems to be petering out now... (rate hike a month or two ago)... but people are feeling the mortgage pinch. I'm glad my parents were able to purchase their dreamhouse in the rainforest during the recession of the early 90's and not now... when it's probably worth about 3 times as much.

Funny thing is that people are chuffed by low interest rates but fail to notice that prices are so much larger that it's probably not going to make a great deal of difference. My parents borrowed for their home at a time when rates were upwards of 17% (Keating's way of "de-spivving" the economy ), yet if they borrowed for it last year when rates were 5% they could well have been paying even more.

It's kinda hard to feel sorry for the people who are complaining about the rise in rates at the moment... if they took out a variable rate loan at the height of a housing spike and at an historically low interest rate (as far as the past 30 years are concerned) then you'd think they'd budget for rate rise... but I guess bubbles are built upon people with spare money (or easy access to credit) and no foresight...

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by el freako
Mortgage debt as % of disposable income in 2003 and (1993):
United States: 84% (64%)
Japan: 62% (54%)
Germany: 77% (54%)
Britian: 102% (78%)
France*: 60% (54%)
Italy: 31% (15%)
Canada: 73% (66%)

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Dissident
where I live housing is overpriced. Many people cannot afford to live in a house (myself included).

It costs about $300,000 to buy an average house where I live. Yes you californians will laugh, but your income is much higher. Our income is the same as it was when housing costed $120,000.

I'm not from California, and I think complaining about 300k is hilarious

[Dis]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker


I'm not from California, and I think complaining about 300k is hilarious

yeah well. Our housing prices have nearly tripled, but our wages haven't. we make less money than the rest of the country (except the south)