Leveling off seen for housing appreciation

[Zorro]

This front-page article from the San Diego Union Tribune gives the current projection of the California housing market in the intermediate term.

<snip>

Flat prices will linger, UCLA economist says.

Today's home buyers may be making a soft landing on a plateau.

The senior economist for UCLA's widely watched Anderson Forecast said yesterday that people buying a house should expect little or no appreciation in prices over the next five or six years as the state's real estate market cools off from its five-year boom.

“Prices people pay today will be about the same in 2011, maybe 2012,” Christopher Thornberg told an audience of about 130 people at the University of California San Diego Economics Roundtable held at the campus faculty club.

<snip>

More at: http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metro/20060217-9999-1n17housing.html

The bloom has been off the real estate rose in my San Diego neighborhood since last summer; I think the local sellers would be quite happy with prices just leveling off, but may be looking at reducing their prices. My gut feeling is that prices are going to be heading south over the next 18 months, principally due to creeping interest rate hikes and ARMs getting readjusted and forcing more people to put their homes on the market.

[JDPriestly]

1. Soft Landing. Heard that one before. Ha!

[Gormy Cuss]

2. In a SF Chronicle article, they described San Diego as the canary

in the coal mine.
The freaky feeding frenzy in our housing market is over.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/02/17/MNG56HAEPV1.DTL&type=realestate

[MannyGoldstein]

3. Prices Plummeting in Mass.

The only two houses that managed to sell in my neigborhood (nice suburb next to Boston) went for more than 20% below asking after sitting for 6 months or so.