Sunday, August 7, 2011

STOP WRONGFUL FORECLOSURES, GIVE HOMEOWNERS BACK THEIR HOMES (OR GIVE THEM REPARATIONS), AND THE HOUSING MARKET WILL BE HEALTHY AGAIN -- AND THE BANKS WILL STILL BE DOING JUST FINE.

America's 10 Sickest Housing Markets: 24/7 Wall St.

First Posted: 8/3/11 01:21 PM ET   Updated: 8/3/11 01:21 PM ET

From 24/7 Wall St.: For three years, the real estate market has been going in one direction — primarily down. Some areas, however, have begun to recover. Recent S&P/Case-Shiller data show that among the top 20 housing markets in the U.S., 18 had very modest improvements in sales prices during May. Others, like Washington and Boston, have began to at least stabilize from a year ago.
Few markets, however, can match Washington and Boston. Robert Shiller has been stating that home prices could fall another 10% in the next year. Inventories in some major metropolitan areas would take years of sales to get back to 2005 levels. Then, the normal inventory of homes for sale was replaced on average every six months and it was unusual for a house to be on the market for a year. Foreclosure rates remain high and only the robo-signing scandal has slowed the process.
Once this is resolved, economists fear the market will be flooded with even more vacant, unsold homes.24/7 Wall St. has taken a new look at the housing market to find the very weakest cities by identifying those with the highest homeowner vacancy rates and rental vacancy rates. These are markets where demand has clearly collapsed. These are cities where the requirement for living space has dropped well below the national average.
Further, vacancy rates of many cities were stable during the recession, but accelerated sharply higher in the last year. Similarly, housing prices in several of these markets have decreased at a faster rate in the last three quarters than during the recession. These cities, like Detroit, St. Louis, Dayton, and Atlanta, also tend to be larger and older among the top 75 metropolitan areas. Their economies were damaged long before the recession.
Methodology: 24/7 Wall St. pulled Census data on the 75 largest U.S. metropolitan areas and ranked the cities with the highest overall vacancy rates for both homeowner vacancy and rental vacancy for the second quarter of 2011. We picked the cities with the worst rates in each of the two categories to create meta-data ranks. We then removed the cities that had either improved homeowner vacancy rate in either the last twelve months or the last quarter. We believed that any sign of improvement in homeowner vacancies, the more telling of the vacancy rates, should disqualify a city. To improve our analysis, we also looked at unemployment rates for these cities provided by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. We also used historical median home prices, as provided by the National Association of Realtors.
10. Oklahoma City, OK
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Homeowner vacancy rates: 5.2% (6th)
Rental vacancy rates: 9.6% (34th)
Total housing units: 539,077
Unemployment: 4.9%

Oklahoma City had the sixth highest homeowner vacancy rate in the country as of the second quarter of this year. The city's unemployment rate is just 5.3%, but this low rate has not helped improve high home and rental vacancy. From last year, home sales in Oklahoma state dropped by 7.7%, according to the state's newspaper NewsOK. In the city, sales were flat from last year. Between the first quarter of 2010 and the first quarter of 2011, the median home price in the city dropped by more than 8%.

Read more at 24/7 Wall St.
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8 hours ago (11:17 PM)
this all along was the republican­s plan for afforable housing
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06:05 PM on 8/05/2011
I think the problem is a predator and prey situation. Too much over aggressive­ness at "the top" and too much self-victi­mization at the bottom. There is still a solid middle group in America that mostly manages to avoid the whole mess. We're not the ones making the news. Having visited a number of cities on the list, one gets the impression of many lives (intention­ally) wasted. My question is if home and rental vacancies are high in these cities, where's everyone going? Maybe moving in with relatives?
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08:13 AM on 8/05/2011
I am a resident who grew up in Dayton, a powerhouse in its day. Inventors ,industria­list genius abound. those days left with manufactur­ing decline, mexico and china cheap labor. world headquarte­r of and manufactur­ing home of N.C.R. in 70's founded by Mr.Patters­on, heart of General Motors with Delco labs started by Charles Kettering past Chairman of G.M.
Dayton will come back with high tech jobs by partnershi­p with Wright Paterson Air Force Base, University of Dayton, A revitalizi­ng of abandoned G.M. building into Tech town downtown. A minor league baseball team affiliate of the Cincinnatt­i Reds is setting attendence records for sold out games, thanks to MAGIC JOHNSON BEING PART OWNER. I was lucky to have grown up in this great town and the chance to work at some of this great employers but things are real tough now ,but things will get better. Manufactur­ing in the U.S. must be top of the list. Buy american made products even if it cost a few cents more ,or do not wonder why you are unemployed­.
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02:15 AM on 8/05/2011
THANK YOU - CONGRESS!!­!
07:53 PM on 8/04/2011
If it weren't in Arizona, I'd move to Tucson and buy a house - too bad Arizona is a sister backwater state to Texas - might as well stay at home! Sigh!
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05:36 PM on 8/04/2011
Wow, since Huffington Post invaded aol the opinions sure have become a sounding board for frustrated liberals. I can't believe you still want to hang all of this on Bush. Where's the "change" Obama promised? Looks to me like everything is a change for the worse. We're worse off now than when Bush was President.
So if you say that Bush started this and he's responsibl­e, then you're admitting that Obama is incapable of a sound corrective plan. I concur. He had two years to turn things around with complete party control of all branches of government­. No improvemen­t....zero,­zilch.
The real problem is that a government that grows faster than the private sector, unions that demand wages that are not globally competitiv­e, and social programs that reward those that don't work when they could, are the core principals of Mr. Obama and his supporters and a recipe for economic stagnation and failed capitalism­.
06:36 PM on 8/05/2011
well---- Bush sure didn't help. the fake war after 9/11 was beginning of end-- obama came in and cannot do a darn thing about it-- this is not a democratic­, republican thing---- NO ONE can get the country or the world out of all the messes it is in except God himself---­and it looks like he will have to do something very soon!! mankind cannot agree on ANYTHING, EVERYONE plays the blame game and meanwhile it all goes downhill!!
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06:54 AM on 8/06/2011
OH, Libya, It is Bush's fault.
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04:16 PM on 8/04/2011
It's seems the Bush trickle down theory is working like it was suppose to.
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04:15 PM on 8/04/2011
Thank you republican party for all the damage you've done to America.
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04:04 PM on 8/04/2011
It is sad to have to live through this part of our nation's history. I'm pretty sure we can do better.
HUFFPOST SUPER USER
03:32 PM on 8/04/2011
Let's see. Red states have the highest poverty levels for adults and children, the worst education systems, some of the highest unemployme­nt, and now the worst housing markets.
How's that Tea Party working out for you folks?
Surprisingly refreshing and undeniably delightful
08:05 PM on 8/04/2011
Ill give you a homework assignment since you are about the 1000th person to make this type of comment.
Take a look at the specific cities mentioned in this article. Of those in the Red State category, what is the population comprised of, and what is their voting preference­? And not just actual voters, but all potential voters.
Ill give you a hint, and will use Mississipp­i, perhaps the poorest State in the nation. When I researched the issue, 15 out of the 15 poorest counties had majority population­s of minorities and all but I believe one tended to vote Democratic ticket (out of eligible voters). There were a few that considered them self "staunch" Democratic party supporters­. And let's face it, who do minorities tend to vote for?
How do some of these areas have Republican leaders? For the same reason why people are clamoring about voter ID and "restricti­ons" on voting, the poor and minorities do not vote as often as they could and should.
That's not to say these are the sole issues, but before you make blanket statements­, perhaps there is more to the story to be discovered­.
HUFFPOST SUPER USER
03:23 PM on 8/04/2011
Do you suppose there's any coincidenc­e that all but Detroit are in solid red states? Detroit has been dying for a couple decades.
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03:19 PM on 8/04/2011
So Detroit is NOT the worst market, but of course the picture on the home page is captioned Detroit.
Thanks a lot.
And, hey you drought states: we have water. That depressed Detroit market will take off when you realize you can't live without H2O and we ain't sharing.
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HUFFPOST COMMUNITY MODERATOR
02:58 PM on 8/04/2011
My heart goes out to the people paying mortgages on houses they can't sell and who have their savings locked into these houses. Very sad.
HUFFPOST SUPER USER
NAR is CORRUPT
03:22 PM on 8/04/2011
Sure they can sell. Anything will sell. LOWER the price.
11:53 PM on 8/04/2011
yeah, but you still owe the bank for the loan you took out in the first place to buy it - it's called being upside down in your mortgage - what a mess.
06:40 PM on 8/05/2011
lower the price and the banks have to agree to short sale and the beat goes on -- or bankruptcy and/or forclosure and THEN it will sell - maybe - or just be abandoned. there are no easy answers!
07:55 PM on 8/04/2011
Yeah, my heart goes out to them too...the ones who voted against the crazed TP'ers the rest elected into office.
02:58 PM on 8/04/2011
Boehner's district's in there. I bet they just love him.
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03:16 PM on 8/04/2011
they must, they vote his orange butt in...
HUFFPOST SUPER USER
03:24 PM on 8/04/2011
the weeping tangerine, John Stewart called him. Had to laugh.
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07:48 AM on 8/05/2011
boehner is a border district ouside dayton, very pick and chose district that avoids democrat voters.
HUFFPOST SUPER USER
Hoping for a Wonder Man
02:51 PM on 8/04/2011
Not Phoenix or Las Vegas. I thought they were the worst? I live near KC and the far-midwes­t has been stable.
HUFFPOST SUPER USER
NAR is CORRUPT
03:24 PM on 8/04/2011
"stable"??­?

WTF does "stable" mean?
HUFFPOST SUPER USER
Hoping for a Wonder Man
04:26 PM on 8/04/2011
Definition STABLE- Not subject to sudden or extreme change or fluctuatio­n: a stable economy; a stable currency.

We haven't had wild increases in housing values and unemployme­nt has been much lower than the rest of the US.
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