I know your having some fun.. no worries mate. If you want some cheap AZ Daily Star entertainment; check out Ernesto Portillo’s column. He has obviously angered a rather large segment of readers and they hammer him *almost* everyday. It’s actually kind of funny to read the comments.

Did you catch the Countrywide Financial Conference call this morning? If you didn’t, there were some notable quotes from CEO Angelo Mozilo:

The Big ONE:
******”Company is seeing home price depreciation at levels not seen since the Great Depression”*****

-Previously, the company had stated they expected a turnaround in mid-2008; now, they say they are not sure when housing declines will cease. Refuse to rule out house price declines in 2009;

-Surprising comment regarding the prime portfolio: so far what they have seen in deliquencies is due to people losing job, losing health, lost marriage, more so than any resets. Stated that the “definition of prime may not be as high as some people think.”

-Expects to hear mergers and people going out of business in the near future;

-The company cut its 2007 earnings forecast to a range of $2.70 to $3.30 a share, down from previously lowered guidance of $3.50 to $4.30 range (projected in April). In the beginning of the year, the company said it expected to earn $3.80 to $4.80 a share.

THE REST:

- “During the quarter, softening home prices continued to affect many areas of the country, and delinquencies and defaults continued to rise across all mortgage product categories as a result.”

-Delinquencies and defaults rising across all investment tools.

-Lower home prices may effect credit.

-S&P Case-Schiller is strong tracking tool for health of housing market
[Editor: we have referenced this many times]

-CFC continues to study further tightening of loan standards for both subprime and prime

-CEO believes markets will force the weaker mortgage companies to either work with bigger players or look elsewhere for business

-For a Fed Governor to say that the lending group had this coming is unbelievable.

From: http://www.nyse.com/events/1182854060287.html

and

http://bigpicture.typepad.com/comments/2007/07/countrywide-hom.html

As to John Stobeck’s numbers and some confusion. You have to remember there are two Real Estate Markets. New Home Construction, this is what is most reported in the media. And Resale market. This is the market of median sale price, not New Construction. So one will turn before the other. It is often hard to distinguish which is being discussed, many national media writers only talk about New Home construction as if that was all there is to a Real Estate market.

The titles were just my way of trying to have a little fun with the Arizona Daily Star. Remember the article they ran in a Sunday paper headlines Homes Languishing on the market. When the article was actually read the home they were tracking that hadn’t sold for 8 months and was languishing on the market HADN’T EVEN BEEN BUILT YET!!!! So it was in that vein I was making up the Over the Top Headlines.

First Concerned. No there is no censorship here other than pornography and profanity. There is a spam filter or there would be tons of bogus comments everyday. The spam filter is triggered if there are more than two links in a post. I then am notified of a comment for approval or spam.

I had to go to Phoenix today to pick up our daughter and there was a truck and auto fire and explosion on I-10. It held traffic for about 6 hours. We had to go back roads around it and just arrived home after leaving Phx. almost 5 hours ago.

Censored, I like your “I know for a fact the moderator here consors input. If you have been censored it was only because you got caught in a spam blitz and you had more than three links in your comment.

For those that don’t run blogs, a spam blitz is when several hundred comments come in all in a couple of hours. All selling access to porn sites. They get bulk deleted. If you just happened to post in the middle of one of those your comment would have been missed. I don’t get email notifications on those.

Even though the situation in Tucson is obviously not rosy, I still believe it’s really not as bad as it is in CA (have you seen the ridiculous shacks and their asking prices here http://drhousingbubble.blogspot.com/) and FL for various reasons. First, the prices never went as crazy here as they did there. Second, the percentage of subprime mortgages here was much lower. Third, we seem to attract more population and businesses. Supposedly, we rank #20 on the list of 25 cities best for jobs http://hubpages.com/hub/Best_Cities_USA_Jobs?utm_source=rss-tag&utm_medium=rss. Then again, depends on what jobs… Tucson’s never been known for well-paying jobs.

I was just about ready to fold my daily research giving me a headache , when I saw these numbers from Dec 06, on this site: http://www.praedium-advisors.com/assets/pdfs/phoenix2006.pdf

Regionally, the strongest increase in the median existing single-family
home price was in the West, where the price rose 12 percent to $344,000
during the first quarter. After Phoenix-Mesa-Scottsdale, the strongest
increase in the West was in Spokane, Wash., at $172,100, up 26.3 percent;
followed by Eugene-Springfield, Ore., at $223,600; up 25.3 percent from
the first quarter of 2005; and the Tucson area, at $248,600, up 24.9
percent.

I wasn’t watching the market at the time, but if this is true, how come 229K is now considered the highest median price in history…?! Even if the data above is not exactly from Dec 06, this median price must’ve been reached at some point. Remember reading in one of the “money” magazines quite some time ago that Tucson is projected to bottom out in the 2nd quarter of ‘08. This Strobeck guy I was asking about before was projecting second half of ‘07, I believe… Btw, what’s the deal with these price ranges in the listings again last few months?! I recall it being popular in ‘05, but now…

Noticed something interesting in the paper over the weekend, though. There are again “coming soon” communities in the new construction section. If I’m not mistaken, haven’t seen that for a while. Don’t know what to think anymore… The builders’ stock has plummeted… new communities coming up… Lennar’s stock is down 50% compared to July 05. The rest are not doing much better. The cancellation rates are in the 25-38% range, even up to 50% according to some… Pulte is warning for big losses, part of the reason being walking away from deposits ironically… just what the customers are doing.

When I first considered this new house, it was because the prices were slashed down by 10K and then went up by 2K. Who knows… maybe that’s as low as it’s gonna go. Should’ve just bought resale and gotten it over with. These months of suspense ahead are just gonna kill me.:-( It’s not fun at all to have a fixed price already and to wait as a trapped animal what interest rates are gonna hit you. It’s supposed to be a joyous anticipation and instead it’s turning out to be a nerve-wrecking experience. I’m not some investor or a bank who can afford to lose tens of thousands of dollars.

I was just about ready to fold my daily research giving me a headache , when I saw these numbers from Dec 06, on this site: http://www.praedium-advisors.com/assets/pdfs/phoenix2006.pdf

Regionally, the strongest increase in the median existing single-family
home price was in the West, where the price rose 12 percent to $344,000
during the first quarter. After Phoenix-Mesa-Scottsdale, the strongest
increase in the West was in Spokane, Wash., at $172,100, up 26.3 percent;
followed by Eugene-Springfield, Ore., at $223,600; up 25.3 percent from
the first quarter of 2005; and the Tucson area, at $248,600, up 24.9
percent.

I wasn’t watching the market at the time, but if this is true, how come 229K is now considered the highest median price in history…?! Even if the data above is not exactly from Dec 06, this median price must’ve been reached at some point. Remember reading in one of the “money” magazines quite some time ago that Tucson is projected to bottom out in the 2nd quarter of ‘08. This Strobeck guy I was asking about before was projecting second half of ‘07, I believe… Btw, what’s the deal with these price ranges in the listings again last few months?! I recall it being popular in ‘05, but now…

Noticed something interesting in the paper over the weekend, though. There are again “coming soon” communities in the new construction section. If I’m not mistaken, haven’t seen that for a while. Don’t know what to think anymore… The builders’ stock has plummeted… new communities coming up… Lennar’s stock is down 50% compared to July 05. The rest are not doing much better. The cancellation rates are in the 25-38% range, even up to 50% according to some… Pulte is warning for big losses, part of the reason being walking away from deposits ironically… just what the customers are doing.

When I first considered this new house, it was because the prices were slashed down by 10K and then went up by 2K. Who knows… maybe that’s as low as it’s gonna go. Should’ve just bought resale and gotten it over with. These months of suspense ahead are just gonna kill me.:-( It’s not fun at all to have a fixed price already and to wait as a trapped animal what interest rates are gonna hit you. It’s supposed to be a joyous anticipation and instead it’s turning out to be a nerve-wrecking experience. I’m not some investor or a bank who can afford to lose tens of thousands of dollars.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIQaQn722QU