The Housing Bubble

The Kansas City Star reports from Missouri. “Real estate agent Cindy Tomasic was taken aback by her first foreclosure listing in tony Loch Lloyd. Then she got her second Loch Lloyd listing. And surprise turned to revelation about what is happening to the values of homes in some of the Kansas City area’s ritziest ZIP codes. ‘I was shocked — who in Loch Lloyd gets foreclosed on?’ asked Tomasic. ‘It’s not just one group of people, not just one income level — foreclosures are affecting everyone.’”

“A review by The Kansas City Star of real estate listings in Jackson, Johnson, Clay, Platte and Cass counties showed at least 50 homes priced $500,000 or more are in foreclosure or are subject to bank-approved sales to avoid one. Experts said the number of pricey distressed properties could be even higher because some people sell their homes before letting their banks know they can no longer make the payments.”

“‘You used to rarely see high-end foreclosures. Now they’re more common,’ said Tim Harrison, an Overland Park real estate investment analyst who helped the newspaper identify troubled high-end properties. ‘People are desperately trying to get rid of houses they can’t afford.’”

“As a result, real estate agents point to some bargain-basement prices on homes boasting 4,000 square feet or more.”

“Examples abound: A $1.5 million Blue Springs home with staircases to east and west wings, a dance floor and five garages listed for $1.05 million. A $1.4 million Independence home with two decks, a poolside wet bar, hot tub and waterfall offered for less than $1 million. A $1.3 million, 6,500-plus square-foot Hallbrook home with granite, marble and hardwood floors sold for $849,000. A $1.25 million Loch Lloyd home with a wine cellar and an imported English pub bar sold in foreclosure for $775,000.”

“A $1.1 million Mission Hills home in foreclosure is under contract for less than $450,000. Many of the homes are in newer subdivisions.”

“‘You saw a huge demand because anyone could get a loan unless they had really bad credit,’ said Curtis Koons, the director of assessment for Jackson County.”

“But prices that go up fast can fall even faster. Consider the history of a house on 64th Terrace off Meyer Circle in Kansas City. A California investor bought it for $450,000 in 2003, rehabbed it and listed it for sale at $890,000, property records show.For three years it sat unsold. Then suddenly the house was reported sold in 2006 for $1.23 million. Records showed the buyer took out loans totaling more than $1 million — or about 90 percent of the home’s value.”

“But the buyer never moved in, and the home has remained vacant. This past year, the home was listed in ‘pre-foreclosure.’ Now, its asking price is $850,000. Neighbor Dan Bowman shook his head and wondered aloud: ‘How can a house sit unsold at $890,000 for three years and then get bought for $1.25 million — then go into foreclosure? It doesn’t make sense.’”

“Don Wratchford ran a successful business customizing and reselling homes after living in them a few years. Then the bottom fell out. Wratchford said his latest 10,000-square-foot home in the Shoal Creek Valley subdivision ‘took a major hit in value.’ The house, which features a basketball court, was appraised about a year ago at $1.7 million. Now, it is listed for $1.1 million.”

“William Seitz bought a bank-owned home in Loch Lloyd for nearly half its previously listed value of more than $1 million. Seitz and his wife jumped at the deal before they even sold their Deer Creek home.”

“‘You hear a lot of doom and gloom,’ he said, ‘but there’s never been a better time to buy a house.’”

“Now, all he has to do is sell his Deer Creek residence. So far, he hasn’t had any takers — even after dropping the price $100,000 below the appraised value.”

The Journal & Courier from Indiana. Four years ago, while much of the country was riding a wave of rising home starts and home values, a few Tippecanoe County Realtors, lenders and others were worried. Despite a boom in new construction, Tippecanoe housing resale values were among the lowest in the country, and foreclosures were being filed with increasing rapidity. Now foreclosure woes and sluggish home sales have spread nationwide. Tippecanoe, however, far from moving beyond the crisis, remains a bit mired.”

“‘We got into this earlier, so I had hoped we’d get out of it earlier,’ said said Marie Morse, interim executive director of Lafayette Neighborhood Housing, of the foreclosure problem. ‘But so far, we’re not there.’”

“According to Tippecanoe County clerk records, the number of foreclosure filings has grown every year since 2002.”

“Richard Murray, VP of administration with Lafayette Community Bank, traces the foreclosure crisis back to 2002. From November 2002 to July 2004, he said, the Federal Reserve Bank left the prime interest rate virtually untouched. That created a ‘false housing market’ in which lenders fell over themselves extending credit to current and prospective homeowners.”

“‘People were put in houses with, basically, no money down. It created a lot of people who frankly weren’t prepared to absorb another $1 a gallon gas increase and higher prices for fuel oil and water rate increases,’ Murray said. ‘When faced with putting gas in your car and food on your table, you do that first rather than making your house payments.’”

“The drop in single-family home construction is not necessarily a bad thing, according to Alan White, co-owner of Kalan Homes LLC, a Lafayette-based homebuilder. ‘Part of our problem is we had so much new construction over a period of years — we just had too much inventory. It needed to correct itself,’ he said.”

“Morse said she doesn’t know how the housing slowdown will affect resale prices, but she does know how it has affected homeowners in the construction trades. ‘Not building houses is the reason some of these people are having foreclosure problems, because they’re unemployed,’ she said.”

The Plain Dealer from Ohio. “In the last two years, home prices have dropped across Northeast Ohio and have plunged by double-digit percentages in many communities, according to an analysis by The Plain Dealer. Cleveland Heights down 11 percent. Mayfield down 10 percent. Akron down 14. Painesville down 13. Even formerly hot areas like Independence and North Olmsted are down 4 percent from 2005 to 2007.”

“Poorer communities have fared the worst. Cleveland is down 49 percent, Lorain 34 percent and East Cleveland a shocking 84 percent.”

“‘Six to eight months ago, people were saying this was going to be a subprime-only issue,’ said Chicago banking analyst Jaime Peters. ‘Now, we’re seeing rapid deterioration.’”

“Peters, who is with the research firm Morningstar Inc., said how far housing values are going to drop is ‘the $400 billion question.’”

“‘People aren’t going to start to buy unless they feel like they’re getting a good deal and a home that’s not going to lose value,’ she said. ‘Banks aren’t going to lend until they feel like they’re going to get paid back. That’s not going to happen until the delinquencies start leveling off. The delinquencies aren’t going to start leveling off until people start buying some of these homes where the people are in trouble. Don’t you love that circular logic? It seems pretty dire.’”

“For everyone who thought housing prices would never decline — especially in Northeast Ohio — this loss of wealth has been jarring. ‘There was no bubble that burst in this state,’ said real estate agent Renee Vartorella in Sagamore Hills. ‘That’s what’s so frustrating.’”

“Christine and Mike Turrington of Garfield Heights have reason to be concerned about what they’re seeing in their community. They bought their 1,500-square-foot home in 1987 for $64,200. Homes in the neighborhood were selling a few years ago in the $130s and $140s.”

“Now the home across the street is in foreclosure. So is the house next door. A foreclosed house halfway down the block is listed for $55,000. One on the next block is $67,000. A house a few doors down that’s not a foreclosure is listed at $89,900. It was valued at $95,900 by the county in 2006.”

“So many homes around the Turringtons are vacant. So many homes are rented to people who don’t care about the properties, Christine said. ‘We don’t want to move, we love our house, but I don’t think we have a choice.’”

“Vartorella said home prices are also being pushed down by foreclosures and desperate sellers. While many of the foreclosures are priced ridiculously low because they’re in bad shape, she said, other homes are heavily discounted because owners want out.”

“One of her listings in Maple Heights along the Garfield Heights border is at $109,000. Within a one-block radius, there are 12 other homes for sale. Seven are listed at $35,000 or less. Four are in the $15,000 range. Only two others are $90,000 or higher. Her seller’s home was assessed by the county for tax purposes at $92,000 two years ago.”

“‘It’s very tough to compete with sellers who don’t care what the houses go for,’ Vartorella said.”

The Morning Sun from Michigan. “Construction is to begin later this spring in Mt. Pleasant on what developers hope will be the most desirable address in central Michigan: Riverplace on Broadway.”

“The project will consist of 22 luxury condominium units, plus first-floor parking. The second and third floors each will contain eight 2,000-square-foot units. The top floor will contain four 2,000-square-foot units along with a pair of 4,000-square-foot condominiums.”

“Moving into Riverplace on Broadway won’t be cheap. Saxton said the prices begin -in the low $350s” ($350,000) for the smaller units, up to about $750,000 for the double penthouse units. Greg Saxton, the project manager, said he’s confident that even though the real estate market may be soft, the units will find a market.”

“‘They are definitely luxurious and upscale,’ Saxton said.”

The Wisconsin State Journal. “Standards for home mortgages also are getting tougher in Wisconsin, especially for loans that banks pass on to national mortgage wholesalers.”

“‘The market has walked away from low credit scores, high loan-to-value and stated-asset-type loans,’ said Ron Steinhofer, president of the Wisconsin Mortgage Bankers Association.”

“Drive-by or quick appraisals sometimes used during the home sales boom a few years ago have disappeared. These kinds of appraisals, which represented about 5 percent of the local appraisal market, relied on assumptions that property values would continue to rise, said Nick Rahn of Dane County Appraisal of Madison.”

“‘I don ‘t think you can make those assumptions anymore,’ he said.”

“Gene DeYoung of DeYoung Appraisal Service in Madison said he hates drive-by or quick appraisals and is glad they’re gone. He said they sometimes were used to inflate home values to help people qualify for loans.”

“‘It was a total abuse,’ he said. ‘You will find that type of thing is quite often the reason for foreclosures.’”

The Pioneer Press from Minnesota. “In 1997, the Ramsey County sheriff’s department served 400 home-foreclosure notices. Last year, the half-dozen sheriff’s deputies who work in the office’s civil division delivered 2,352, about 75 percent of them in St. Paul.”

“The sheriff’s office served 632 notices from Jan. 1 through March 21 of this year, and officials believe they will exceed 3,000 by year’s end.”

“Their Hennepin County counterparts are, comparatively speaking, off the charts — 5,563 notices delivered last year and 1,251 in just the first two months of this year.”

“‘It used to be a few properties scattered about the city,’ says Ramsey County sheriff’s deputy Jeff Hallanger. ‘But now this is normal.’”

“Metro Legal Services, a major Twin Cities-based private process-server firm, handles 1,200 foreclosure notices monthly in the 10-county metro area, according to Scott Gray, the firm’s vice president.”

“‘We did maybe 50 to 100 a month in 2004,’ said Gray, who added that foreclosures now rank as the second-most-delivered legal paper handled by his firm. They ranked at the bottom a few years ago. No. 1? Serving credit card debt lawsuits, which the firm delivers at a mind-blowing clip of 200 a day.”

“‘Many times we deliver both (credit card and foreclosure notices) to the same place,’ Gray said.”