Thursday, September 23, 2010

Existing home sales increases


Bloomburg reports-

"Sales of U.S. previously owned homes climbed from a record low in August and a gauge of the outlook for the economy increased, confirming the Federal Reserve’s forecast for a “modest” pace of expansion.

Economists forecast home sales at a 4.1 million pace, according to the median of 72 projections in a Bloomberg News survey. Estimates ranged from 3.8 million to 5 million.

Compared with a year earlier, sales were down 17 percent before adjusting for seasonal patterns. The median price increased 0.8 percent from August 2009 to $178,600 last month."

The problem with the housing outlook as reported by another source, is that of inventory. There is a large inventory, and more than a 12 month supply at these activity levels, Buyer still are very sluggish in stepping up and actually buying.

Lets hope some of the other key indicators in the economy will give the buyers more confidence to come forward soon!


Monday, September 20, 2010

Benefits to Homeownership in poor market


The New York Times ran a story entitled "Housing Fades as Means to Build Wealth Analysts Say". The article documents the problems of the past several years where housing prices can not be relied upon to automatically increase from one year to the next. Many people have purchase houses on the premise that these year to year increases will help them build wealth; but the events of the past several years has proven this unreliable.

The Brookings just published an article siting the second benefit of home ownership is a way to have a forced savings. They said "That said, I am doubtful that we should be giving up on homeownership as a way for households to build wealth. Home appreciation was only one factor behind the original enthusiasm for this potential benefit to homeownership. A second (and perhaps more important) factor was the view that owning a home induced people to do some saving, first for the downpayment and later through paying down principal as part of their monthly mortgage obligations."

Friday, September 17, 2010

CRS Attended the AAA Marketing & IT Conference this Week!

Consumers Relocation was fortunate enough to be invited to join the AAA Marketing & IT Conference in Los Angeles this past Tuesday and Wednesday. We experienced everything from great presentations and workshops to a fun trade show to watching King King 360 3-D at Universal Studios. What an amazing week with great people! The picture to the left is of the CRS booth at the trade show. We had tons of goodies and even raffled off a Wyoming West Gift Bag straight from Jackson, WY! Congratulations to Teri Kerrigan from Ohio Auto Club who was the lucky winner!

Thursday, September 16, 2010

Economic Recovery tracked in 100 Largest Metro areas

Brookings Institute recently published their study on the economic recovery in 100 metropolitan areas. The study clearly points out that the Midwest, and inter-mountain areas are the strongest and the west and east coast in general are continue to be the most sluggish.

METROMONITOR: 2ND QUARTER 2010
9
Unemployment Rate
Unemployment continued to plague metropolitan areas hit hardest by the housing bust. California
and Florida contained 11 of the 15 metropolitan areas with the highest unemployment rates in June.
Those California and Florida metropolitan areas, along with Las Vegas, had staggering unemployment
rates as much as 7.5 points above the national average. Metropolitan areas with heavy state and federal
government employment continue to boast some of the lowest unemployment rates.
The manufacturing centers of the Great Lakes region saw some of the largest declines in
unemployment rates since one year ago. Although unemployment rates remained largely unchanged
nationwide and in the 100 largest metropolitan areas as a whole, 12 metropolitan areas, including Detroit,
Toledo, Minneapolis, Youngstown, Portland (OR), and Wichita, had unemployment rate declines of one
percentage point or more in the last year. Meanwhile, the unemployment situation worsened since a year
ago in housing-bust metropolitan areas and in a few state capitals (Harrisburg, Sacramento, and Jackson).

For the full report

http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/Files/Programs/Metro/metro_monitor/2010_09_metro_monitor/0915_metro_monitor.pdf

Wednesday, September 1, 2010

Your new Home

After moving into a new home, it is important to make that home feel like your own. It may take some time and a lot of thought, but it can be done. If you are looking for some insight on design concepts, check out my new favorite interior design firm ROOT Interiors. All communication is done via phone and email and can be done worldwide. All it takes is a few questions and the designers are off creating an amazing look for your home! Visit http://www.rootinteriors.com/ to learn more about this creative, innovative company!