Home sales have already crashed...and forecasts are being revised downward every week. They’re already at a 15-year low in Southern California.
And now, the “housing slump is starting to pinch the economy,” says an item at the San Francisco Gate. Shopping malls are feeling the pain, adds the New York Times.
And in Detroit, some 700 houses are to be auctioned off between September 21st and 23rd. These houses have been on the market for more than a year. The banks and mortgage lenders who own them are desperate to get them off the books. So this should be interesting...finally, we’re going to see houses marked to market. Some are expected to go for as little as US$5,000. Well, at least the cost of housing is going down...at least in Motown.
Here in London, the Financial Times reports that property prices fell in August – for the first time in two years. Property bulls argue that Britain is a small island and that there is a shortage of housing. Yet, there are said to be about 850,000 empty properties in England alone.
Bill Bonner
The Daily Reckoning Australia
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About the Author
Best-selling investment author Bill Bonner is the founder and president of Agora Publishing, one of the world's most successful consumer newsletter companies. Owner of both Fleet Street Publications and MoneyWeek magazine in the UK, he is also author of the free daily e-mail The Daily Reckoning.
