The United States of Empty Houses: More On Sale As More Foreclosures Expected

In some parts of the country, you can practically trip over all of the vacant houses up for sale.

By one estimate (the National Association of Realtors)–there are nearly 4 million homes (defined as everything from a townhouse to a condo to anything pretty much you can live in, except your car!) just waiting to be scooped up.

This, of course, is driving down prices even lower–to the point where, in some markets, sales are picking up.

But there are several danger signs ahead.

For one thing, each of these homes may represent a job lost or a family’s life expectations greatly diminished.

More to the point, many economists are seeing a new wave of foreclosures upon us—not those the result of subprime mortgages, but ones that represent mortgages given to people who had good to even excellent credit, only to see that plummet due to job loss or other economic family/personal hardship.

A revealing set of figures now from a New York Times article: “The median home price nationwide climbed slightly to $170,200 in April from $169,900 in March,” the paper quotes from one report. “Prices, however, were down from $201,300 in April a year ago,” says the paper.

The tricky part is this—while those who still have good credit may be able to take advantage of the lower prices to snap up some real bargains, they run the risk, of course, that , as foreclosures continue to grow, flooding the market with even more homes, their new investment can erode in value.

If they are buying for the long run, they may be able to sit things out (inside their new homes) till prices eventually go back up. But, if they are buying now for investment purposes, they may, in the short run, end up with the short end of the stick.

Related posts:

1. The United States’ Foreclosure Problem – Solved with PMS!
2. Bank of America Buys The United States – Or Close To It!
3. Foreclosures Matter! How Foreclosures have affected homeowners, investors and the economy
4. Real Estate / Financial Crisis Turns Deadly; Crisis-Related Suicides Expected To Rise
5. Is Investing in Real Estate in Other States a Good Idea?

Article Author: Charles Feldman

Charles has written 179 articles for us.
Visit Charles's Website: http://www.thefeldmanblog.com

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Charles is currently reporting for KNX Radio in Los Angeles, is the co-author of the book No Time To Think, and can be found commenting about the news on his blog, The Feldman Blog, as well as on The Huffington Post.