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Wednesday, January 24, 2007

One more indication of how the real estate market is different than the stock market showed up in two recent stories from California, one of the nation's formerly hot housing markets that has turned decidedly lukewarm over the last year or so.

Unlike stocks in 2000, when, a few months after the peak nearly everyone could look and see that the tide had turned, today, more than a year after prices peaked in much of the state, the outlook for many has not yet changed.

According to this report in the Press Telegram in Long Beach the other day, the number of realtors in California is now at an all-time high.

When talking on the phone with Tom Pool you can almost envision some spooked character in a B-movie waiting out a zombie invasion in a boarded house.

"Our licensee population is still going up, even though we're in a transitioning market," the California Department of Real Estate spokesman said.

It may sound ghastly, but for the last year people continued to mob the real estate industry despite the market downturn.

About one in 70 Californians is now a licensed Realtor.

As of December there were more than 521,000 licensed Realtors in California, according to the DRE, which issues licenses.

That's an all-time high. The previous high was during the end of the last real estate boom in the early 1990s, when there were 375,000 licensed agents in California.

Before the most recent housing market surge, the number of licensees had dipped to 297,000 by 1998, according to the DRE. The historical level is 300,000.

But when the housing market began to take off around 2000, so did interest in residential real estate.

As of this time last year the number of licensees topped 470,000. In the past year, after the market turned south, more than 50,000 people earned their licenses.
Donald Trump and his ilk can be thanked for much of the continuing interest in real estate careers during a period when the word "transition" fails to properly characterize the events on the ground.

Contrast the previous report with this story in today's LA Times and you'll see there's a great disconnect between the mood of many Californians and the latest market data.
The number of Californians defaulting on their mortgage loans is rising rapidly, according to figures released Tuesday, providing striking evidence that more people are at risk of losing their homes.

Default notices jumped 145% in the last three months of 2006, accelerating a trend that began in late 2005 as home sales started to cool.

It was the largest number of default notices in any three-month period since 1998.
Analysts said the increase was not worrisome — yet. But if the number continues to escalate, it could drag down home values in certain communities, they warned.

"So far, this isn't alarming," said John Karevoll, chief analyst at DataQuick Information Systems, which compiled the data. But if default notices "keep going up at this rate, it could get nasty fast," he added.
The slope of that curve should be very alarming. That's the whole purpose of an alarm - to warn you in advance that something bad may be about to happen. To say, "So far, this isn't that bad" would have been far more accurate.

While the number of default notices per quarter is still not far away from the historical average, looking even better in percentage terms when factoring in the population growth over the last ten years, the pace at which they are accelerating amid flat home prices (according to the official statistics) should be great cause for concern.

What should be extremely alarming is that during the fourth quarter of 2006, there was a 595 percent increase in the number of homes that actually went into foreclosure versus a year ago.

Most homes that enter preforeclosure (the initial notice of default when the owner falls behind on their mortgage payments) never enter foreclosure proceedings either because the borrower catches up on their payments or sells the place. With so many new homeowners putting little or no money down and expecting rising prices to cure any financial ills, the situation has changed dramatically.

In fact, a year ago, foreclosures as a percent of preforeclosures were only 6 percent.

A year later, this has risen to 16 percent!

Little of this seems to have affected the outlook of those aspiring to real estate careers. The combination of ever-upbeat real estate industry professionals and a mood that is very slow to change should make the reversion of the California real estate market to more realistic fundamentals a long, drawn out affair.

5 comments:

Metroplexual said...

I don't see why anyone would be surprised in the RE biz. Unless they are completely ignorant of what is happening out there with their buyers. CA had more than half of its buyers buying with nontraditional loans in 2006 and I think 2005. ARMS have the resets built in two or three years out typically so we are seeing the carnage from loans made in 2003 and 2004. These weren't even the peak price years of 2005 and 2006.

Nationally, ARM resets last year were on around 6% of the outstanding mortgage debt ($600 Billion or so). This year should prove even more interesting due to the $1.3 trillion ARM resets. I am already seeing ditech commercials aimed at the ARM borrowers to get into a fixed rate loan. Some just won't qualify as they struggle to pay higher payments.

This is when that curve will get even steeper Tim. I am guessing the 1996 peak will be dwarfed.

Out of curiousity does anyone know the dollar amount of ARM resets for 2008 nationally?

Anonymous said...

MOst in the RE biz are pretty clueless about broader trends...they are in sales and they have to sell...most could give a crap about the financing...it's as simple as, "you want this house, let's see if we can get you financed"...it becomes an emotional decision for both the buyer and the agent.

Anonymous said...

I cannot prove this, but I strongly suspect that most, if not all, of these new agents are "investors" who are trying the DIY route. They have seen the trend, and are trying to contain the costs unloading their "investments". The "realtor" name is supposed to help them avoid the 6% racket - or so they think.

Whether they would be successful, of course, is a totally unrelated matter.

I suspect this because of the strongly incestuous nature of this business - most of the "realtors" are "investors", and as it gets worse, most of the "investors" will become "realtors", until the distinction disappears.

Anonymous said...

A buddy of mine has been a realtor for about 5 years. Excellent salesman and has been the regional leader at his firm for the last 3 years.

While he'll likely be one of the survivors as a realtor, he's self destructing by continuing to buy houses and condos. I haven't been able to talk him out of it. His head is in the sand on the larger trends.

But, there is a reasonable chance that prices will stay up nominally. In that case he'll be fine, so who knows?

zephyr said...

Real estate is very cyclical. At the peaks almost everyone is in. Many must buy at the top to make a top happen. Many must sell at the bottom to make the bottom happens. The smart money does the opposite. In real estate if you avoid or survive the downturns you will thrive.

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