Comments on: New-Home Sales Suffer More than EHS This Recession

By: alfred e

alfred e — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 02:59:36 +0000

@wunsacon: OUCH. How true.

@Pat: Yeah. Everything here says lots of houses are being kept off the market and/or not foreclosed on.
Part of it is realtors are trying to stabilize prices to draw buyers in from the sidelines. I don’t think it’s working too well.

By: Pat G.

Pat G. — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 02:42:52 +0000

“Its intriguing — but not surprising — that new Homes are faring worse than existing homes . . ..”

Yeah, it’s like buying a used car, there’s depreciation and necessary repairs. So, you negotiate a better deal. However, I think that there is a lot more shadow inventory of used houses waiting to come unto the market once the FED figures out how to stabilize housing prices. That said, new home sales should fare even worse. I don’t think we’ve seen all the layoffs occur in the construction industry, quite yet.

By: wunsacon

wunsacon — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 02:41:18 +0000

>> Builders would hire anyone to do work, people who had no business swinging a hammer.

Sounds like the software biz.

By: Moss

Moss — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 02:34:24 +0000

Another factor would have to be the large number of foreclosures in ‘nebie’ developments. With 5 or 6 houses for sale within shouting distance who would buy? Existing homes on the other hand are usually in established neighborhoods where not as many peeps are under water.

By: JMH

JMH — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 01:45:55 +0000

One long term problem that has yet to be discussed is the quality of the construction in the 2003-2006 period. Builders would hire anyone to do work, people who had no business swinging a hammer. Many of the contractors will be long gone by the time all of the construction defects appear in 5-10 years. I sure wouldn’t buy a property built during the bubble time frame.

By: call me ahab

call me ahab — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 21:43:26 +0000

with new homes- you get tray ceilings- 500 sf bathrooms- walk-in closets the size of bedrooms- granite counters- stainless steel appliances, etc, etc, etc

so a home is much like Karen talking about the new fall ladies handbags- you don’t want to get caught dead in last years model-

and the new homes have the latest Chinese drywall- so what if it off-gases and makes you sick- and with new homes you have interior doors so thin that they flap in the breeze when the A/C kicks on- solid doors- what are they good for-

man I wish I had a new home

By: DM RTA

DM RTA — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 21:02:28 +0000

Mark and Todd make good observations. It tempting for me to look at it as if they are somehow reverting to (more) staples oriented purchases versus the discretionary sector in the short term. But…what happens if the bid for mortgage paper dries up as those pesky issues related to transparency in the bundling of mortgages are addressed? How much agency paper can the Fed really buy before the securitization system is forced to have standards that match the guarantees ? In a Bailout Nation, is 10% retained by the originator really going to convince anyone the system is fixed and now somehow much safer?

I know I stretched this conversation into another area and time horizon but if you follow Doug Noland’s weekly missive you have to be wondering a lot about that busy man behind the curtain and why we seem to have so much faith in him that we are watching for a “bottom”. Many kids growing up right now are being taught lessons they will never forget in the days ahead when they have money.

By: Christopher

Christopher — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 20:26:32 +0000

PS….my builder buddy noted how shoddy the construction is on nearly anything built since 2000.

He used one of my favorite country phrases….”pig in a dress”….

By: Christopher

Christopher — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 20:23:45 +0000

“….size….”

The era of the mcmansion is thankfully over it appears.
I never got the attraction to more to heat/cool/furnish/clean/maintain homes.

My builder friend out here is working on several now big eyesores now…converting the beasts to multi-family. Of course the zoning out here in flyover is less thorny than the coasts.

Any remaining doubts I had about the VAPID STUPIDITY (redundant?) of Ammmerica (mm for massmediamorons) have been moonwalked into oblivion.

Fuck Michael Jackson.
There I said it…..

By: VennData

VennData — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 19:55:58 +0000

“…Its intriguing — but not surprising — that new Homes are faring worse than existing homes . . ..” means all those clever, well-compensated businessmen blew it.