More on the Housing Bubble

Like I've said before, I stopped looking to buy a house and instead have decided to do some remodeling on my condo (although I have yet to start). I'm still keeping my eye on the housing market and watching home prices fall, sometimes a little, sometimes a lot. An article on this blog show a few examples of condos in Little Italy, in a complex that I looked at several, have fallen in price over $200,000 in the past two years. I am so glad I didn't buy back then. Another problem they are having in some downtown condos is that due to so many foreclosures, HOA fees are not being paid. If someone can't afford their mortgage, they certainly can't afford their homeowners dues. This affects the other owners, and will likely cause the already high fees to go higher.

Del Sur, another development in San Diego that I almost bought a new home at, seems to be holding out. It looks like the developers are not building until they have a sale. The particular subdivision that I was interested in by Shea Homes has sold out. I know they had to reduce prices and and offer incentives, but I'm still surprised all the homes sold. And I'm not seen them on the market, probably because if the homes were bought by flipper's, they don't want to sell at a loss.

One of the blogs I read daily, Bubble Markets Inventory Tracking, which you can find a link to on the right side of this blog, had to have a post removed because the blog writer was threatened with a lawsuit. Apparently the owner of the house being reported on was not happy that people were talking about him. All the information on the blog was publicly available. Even thought the post is gone, many other bloggers, including this one, posted the same story. The owner of the house in Poway was facing foreclosure, owed $20,000 in property taxes, and to boot, he is the CEO of some company. You can see the listing of his home on Redfid, a site I have found very useful for looking at properties for sale. The listing includes the Parcel Number, which can be entered in the San Diego County Treasurer site where you can get tax information on any house, including your own. This site will list the owner of the home. Then do a Google search of the owner and you will find out all sorts of information about him, including the fact that he owns 11 ponies. Maybe he could sell a few to pay his property taxes. So I guess the moral of this story is bloggers unite - we are not going away any time soon!