Set your watch to Super Bowl Sunday

This blast from the past couldn't come on a better day, it being Super Bowl Sunday and all.

When trying to think of something appropriate for what is, essentially, another national holiday, the name Barbara Corcoran came quickly to mind and long time readers will surely appreciate this short stroll down memory lane.

For those of you unfamiliar with Ms. Corcoran, she is a New York real estate commentator who, decades ago, founded the real estate firm The Corcoran Group which she then sold in 2001 for some $70 million.

Since that time she's written a number of books, authored various real estate columns, and served as a speaker at many venues around the country, often times appearing on major networks as a "real estate expert".

As one of the perma-est of all housing perma-bulls, Ms. Corcoran was one of the many housing bubble "deniers" a few years back, going so far as to lock horns with Jim Rogers on a particularly entertaining edition of Fox's Cavuto on Business which is excerpted below.

This item originally appeared in November of 2005...

Corcoran: It's funny what's happening right now - there's so much uncertainty in the market, and everybody's been spooked by all the media coverage that's out there that it really is a great time to buy. It's a great opportunity right now, and I don't think it's going to last very long.

I think come January, everybody who doesn't buy the house right now for the price that they could afford is going to wish they had because they are going to be paying more in January.

This "bubble babble" is baloney, and it's scaring people away and making buyers "think about it", and while they're "thinking about it", the house prices are going to go up, and I truly believe that.

Rogers: But Barbara, what's going to make them go up in January? Why are buyers coming back in January?

Corcoran: In January, you can count on it. You can set your watch to Super Bowl Sunday.
[...]
Stein: And as to why you can set your watch to Super Bowl Sunday, I'm totally mystified. Usually, people have to have a reason for something. I'm not quite sure what Barbara's reason is. Are interest rates going to suddenly turn down on Super Bowl Sunday?

Corcoran: Can I address that? First of all interest rates are not high, they're low. Even though we've had five big hikes by the federal government, what has it done to mortgage rates? Barely nothing.

But about Super Bowl Sunday, what I mean is by Super Bowl Sunday, this whole media "babble stuff" that's out there is going to get old, boring - the media is going to move on to something else, and guess what? People are going to be back in the market in droves.

Well, it turns out the housing bubble talk didn't get either old or boring in 2006 and people didn't come back to the market in droves, except as sellers, that is.

Here are a couple follow-up pieces on Ms. Corcoran from later in the year:

• March 13, 2006 - Bubble Sitting
• September 19, 2006 - Barbara Corcoran: Then and Now

As for home prices, we all know what happened in 2006. That was the year of the price peak in many markets, the red line in the chart below indicating the date of the 2006 Super Bowl as a handy reference.
Ahhh... memories.

ooo

This week's cartoon from The Economist: