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Articles
A Spill Into the Psyche, and a Respite, NYT
From the Gulf of Mexico, a respite from the constant stream of bad news, which seems to be part of the national wallpaper...The deepest damage of the spill may be the loss of confidence in institutions, like the federal government and a multinational oil company that held itself up as a beacon of environmental sensitivity. Combine that with public exhaustion over two wars, economic insecurity and disgust over the return of bonuses on Wall Street. This tears against the relief presented by the knowledge that, at least for a bit, the gulf was not being further sullied.“All of these things work together,” said Nadine Kaslow, a psychologist at Emory University. “The national psyche is very depressed. The spill has been going on for so long and there have been so many attempted fixes that people become less trusting that things will really improve. So this becomes a little less front page news, if this really works, but there’s some sense that some other disaster will take its place.”
Out on the Gulf of Mexico, where the surface has come to resemble a floating intensive-care unit — all those hulking ships laden with specialized machinery, bobbing in wait for the next emergency — something good finally happened last week. If only provisionally, oil stopped spewing into the sea.As BP ended its string of futility and affixed a cap to the wellhead, the news comforted a battered American psyche, a counterpoint to a ceaseless narrative of plans going spectacularly awry.More than an environmental catastrophe, the disaster playing out in the gulf has become a festering reminder of the disarray afflicting so many areas of national life, from the cancerous political culture to the crisis of unemployment to an intractable war in Afghanistan, seemingly impervious to whatever plans are dreamed up in Washington.
By Peter S. Goodman, July 16, 2010 NYT
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Need to Sell Your House? Cut the Price, WSJ
Home sellers learned a painful lesson in June: if you want to sell right now, lower the price...but when does it make sense to lower
the price? Trulia’s Tara Nelson offers the following five tips:
* Multiple listing agents have recommended listing the home at a lower price.
* Feedback from the buyers’ agents suggests the home is overpriced.
* The home isn’t getting any showings, even though it’s marketed well.
* The home has sat on the market far longer than other homes in the area.
* There’s been multiple offers, but they’ve all been significantly under the list price.
By Nick Timiroas, July 15, 2010 WSJ
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Sellers Feel Summer Heat And Continue To Slash Home Prices, Trulia.com
Down Economy and High Levels of Home Inventory Put Sellers at Disadvantage as Prices Continue to Drop - Luxury Market Still Feeling The Pain: Price reduction levels for luxury homes (those listed at $2 million and above) continue to provide large discounts with an average of 14 percent off of the original listing price. The average discount for homes priced less than $2 million remains at 9 percent.
SAN FRANCISCO, July 14, 2010 – Trulia.com today announced that 24 percent of listings currently on the market in the United States as of July 1, 2010 experienced at least one price reduction. This represents a nine percent increase from the previous month. The total dollar amount slashed from home prices was $27.3 billion and the average discount for price-reduced homes continued to hold at 10 percent off of the original listing price. Many of the largest U.S. cities saw significant increases in price reduction levels this month with 22 of the top 50 cities across the U.S. experiencing price reduction levels at 30 percent or more, compared to just 10 cities in the previous month.
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How We Sold a House - Becoming a Broker, WSJ
The housing market may be slowly recuperating, but home sellers are now in uncharted territory. Would becoming a real estate agent raise our game? For all their challenges, brokers remain undeniably influential—they're still involved in the vast majority of home sales. That's why we decided to join their ranks, getting trained as a salesperson so we could see how the industry's big fish and small fry are adjusting to the new order.
The worst of the home-price nosedive may be over, but selling a home can still feel like an agonizing stalemate. Nationwide, the average home sits on the market for 150 days, up 43% from two years ago, according to Altos Research. In the Burlington, Vt., area where we're working, the typical high-end house stays on the market for 284 days. To be sure, things aren't as grim as they once were, with low mortgage rates and Congress's now-expired tax breaks having lured bargain hunters into the market. But buyers have become ruthless nickel-and-dimers, the pros say, combing the web for sales data, tax records and any other clue that can justify a lowball offer. Homeowners, meanwhile, aren't hesitating to pull properties off the market if offers are weak. And in many communities, this mutual wariness is slowing sales traffic to a crawl. The real estate cold war is putting unprecedented pressure on the people in the middle: real estate agents. Jackpot winners during the housing boom, these pros sometimes seem like a dying breed today.
By Alyssa Abkowitz, July 15, 2010 WSJ/SmartMoney
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Time to Refinance? Jumbo Mortgage Rates Plunge, WSJ
Nearly two years after the credit crunch virtually froze mortgage markets, high-end borrowers are seeing some relief: Rates for "jumbo" mortgages on pricier homes are at their lowest since 2003.Just a year ago, the average rate on a 30-year jumbo mortgage—a loan of more than $729,750 not backed by government-sponsored agencies Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac—was 6.86%, according to Greg McBride, a senior financial analyst at Bankrate.com. Now it is 5.48%—a rate that rivals those available during the height of the credit bonanza."In just the past couple of months, jumbo loans have really started to be competitively priced," says Keith Gumbinger of HSH Associates, a publisher of consumer-loan information.The lower rates signal relief for homeowners looking to shed an onerous mortgage—and for the high-end housing market itself. More-affordable jumbo loans will likely whet appetites for new home purchases, helping to stabilize prices at the upper end of the market. For consumers, the lower rates will make home purchases more affordable and enable existing homeowners to trim their monthly bills by refinancing.
By Jessica Silver-Greenberg, July 10 ,2010 WSJ
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07/10/10 WSJ
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