Comments about ‘Wasatch Front home sales decline, along with prices’

Wouldn't that be "key" economic indicator?

You mean to tell me that Zion is slumping?

Why is it that every story draws negative religious or Utah culture comments? I just don't see the connection here.

My Granddaughter sold her home and took a loss to get out of the high payments. She had to oay out $4,000 above what she owed. That was 2 months of payments. I lost $40,000 value according to my tax statement but bless our leaders they increased my taxes by $450. How can we be so lucky. Of course the majority goes to our educations system which is rated poor but is that important? We have a mass of uninvited guests in our state who we must make comfortable with education, medical and what ever they need. Our newspapers and churches endorse these guests so how can we be anything but grateful they are here to share bread and water. How blessed can we be. They do go on missions, we are saved.

well, i don't see how illegal immigrants are the cause of higher taxes.
I do think that to have your value decline and have your taxes increase is a bit of tricky number massaging by the county auditor. my house is worth less and suddenly my land is worth more? I've been watching a house in Sandy where the price started at 279 and dropped to 235. As of last week it was raised again to 269? So according to this house, real estate values in Sandy have suddenly increased by 15% this month!
this is a time for us to tighten our belts. Re-evaluate our spending and our saving and investments. We have a few tough years ahead of us.

They saved the key paragraph for the end of the story:

"Sales of existing homes in the greater Salt Lake area have increased each month since the first of the year, and the sales in June 2009 outpaced the previous June by 8 percent, according to Metrostudy. The most recent volume appears to be driven primarily by bank-owned and foreclosure homes, especially at the lower end of the price scale."

Don't be drawn in by the fearmongering media. Yes, the market could be better. I could also be much, much worse. Count your blessings.

Home sales always increase from January to June every year. You have to look at the overall trend. We had a very extended period of above average sales activity. Whenever that happens, it is followed by an equal period of below average sales activity to compensate. There are two factors alone which act to increase sales:

1 - Home prices will continue to decline.
2 - The government will continue to inject money into the housing market in the form of tax credits, low interest rates, and looser lending standards.

It should be noted that these tactics cannot force a recovery (they are the same tactics that caused the problem in the first place). They can however serve to dampen the decline. The results is to cause less pain but over a longer period of time.

You should pass no judgements until winter of this year / early next year. Then I think you'll be able to determine whether this is a flattening out of housing activity or simply a "dead cat bounce".

Home prices are down 20%; another 30% drop is expected. The affordablility index is key -- more price reductions are in the future.