Sorry for another boring Cleveland housing prices post, but really--I'm having this reaction of "Geez, do you really think I'm that dumb?" and needed to share.
So the Plain Dealer wants you to be happy because housing prices have only declined 6.1% in the metro area through the end of 2008. Go, be happy! See things are good! Cheer up! Ha ha, you don't live in Phoenix!
Except see that quote cited to the MLS data the one that one that says prices are down nearly 26%? Isn't that radically different? Who would you trust? Personally, since it's more dour I go with the MLS peeps. Also S&P is a bunch of lying liars who lie.
The white washing includes this cheery graph, but look closely--the high of Cleveland prices was in 2003, 2 years before the height of the market in the rest of the country. The reason why the price drops are slowing, if they really are, is because they've already dropped a hell of a lot.
2 comments:
Yeah, I've been trying to explain to the guys at work that there are people out there like you who bought BEFORE there was any housing bubble in the news, and whose houses are nonetheless 25% or more underwater. They want to believe everyone was irresponsible, but I'm increasingly thinking that most of those people are already flushed out of the system.
It's the deflated prices + no buyers that's the problem now; and the Obama plan does nothing to help that. Oh well.
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