Northern Virginia Weekend Bits Bucket 1/31-2/1 2009

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Happy Super Bowl XLIII!

Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/30/2009

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/29/2009

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In the News:

"The federal government yesterday expanded its bailout to another vulnerable sector, saying it will inject $1 billion into a nonprofit company that provides banking services to the credit union industry. . . . The federal aid comes from assessments on the industry, not from taxpayers. . . . The corporate credit unions together invested about $64 billion from their members in mortgage-related securities, which have declined in value by $18 billion as the market has plunged. Accounting rules are forcing the corporate credit unions to acknowledge those declines. On Monday, U.S. Central told the NCUA [National Credit Union Administration] it estimated a fourth-quarter loss of $1.2 billion on its loan portfolio. The NCUA board met behind closed doors yesterday and then announced the intervention".

Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/28/2009

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S&P/Case-Shiller® November Home-Price Index

The S&P/Case Shiller® composite index (graph here) for the month of November was released today.

"“The freefall in residential real estate continued through November 2008,' says David M. Blitzer, Chairman of the Index Committee at Standard & Poor’s. 'Since August 2006, the 10-City and 20-City Composites have declined every month – a total of 28 consecutive months. Every region was down in excess of 1% for the November/October period, with eight of the regions recording record monthly declines. Phoenix and Las Vegas were the worst performers for the month at -3.4% and -3.3%, respectively, and also have the lowest returns over the one-year period, returning -32.9% and -31.6% respectively. Overall, more than half of the metro areas had record annual declines.'”

Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/27/2009

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/26/2009

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Northern Virginia Weekend Bits Bucket 1/24-1/25 2009

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Hattip Contrarian -- Loudoun assessments dropped last year:

"“You can’t compare what happened in a townhouse to a single-family detached,” he said.

The Sterling district, which has been hit particularly hard by foreclosures, saw a decline in residential property value of about 30 percent, whereas the Blue Ridge District on the western end of the county saw a decline of about 13 percent. Condos in Sterling lost nearly half their value on average, dropping from a total assessed value of about $440 million last year to just under $250 million this year.

“Property owners are affected in drastically different ways,” said Lori Waters, R-Broad Run".

"Washington Leapfrogged London" . . .

From Forbes.com:

"Washington, D.C., traditionally takes a back seat to world cities like London, New York and Tokyo when it comes to real estate investment.

That's likely to change.

Thanks to a proposed $1 trillion wave government spending, investors are flocking to D.C. for opportunities in the commercial and residential real estate markets. All these new programs will need offices, after all, and their employees will need places to live.

This year, Washington leapfrogged London for the first-place ranking in the world's best cities for real estate investment".

Peter Schiff -- the Antidote Man

So, what would you advise policy makers to do?

"They should do nothing. They've done enough damage. Why don't they just let the market work? Why can't we just let housing prices go down? In California, housing prices got to like five or 10 times median household incomes—it was insane. Even though prices have dropped 20 percent, housing is still ridiculously priced. Prices need to come down. It's interesting: Initially, Fannie and Freddie's mission was to help houses be affordable. Now, their mission is to keep housing prices expensive. They are trying to prop up prices and not let them come down. That's the kind of stuff that the government did in the Great Depression. The government tried to stop food prices from coming down; they were destroying cattle and plowing under fields because they didn't want food prices to go down. In bad economic times, they were trying to maintain high food prices so that people who are unemployed have to spend more money to eat. So, now they are trying to maintain high home prices. It's stupid. Why not let home prices fall so that people can buy houses cheaper?"

A Rehab Gone Bad

Yikes.

3404 HOCKETT ST
FALLS CHURCH, VA 22042
List Price: $249,902
Prior Sale: $800,000 2/28/2006
-68.8%

"UNIQUE REO BACK ON MARKET** EXTENSIVE COUNTY VIOLATIONS NEED CORRECTION (NO OCCUPANCY ALLOWED AT THIS TIME)**THIS PROPERTY IS CHEAP BUT NOT FOR EVERYBODY**PRICE IS FIRM** CASH OFFERS ONLY--NO EXCEPTIONS**SERIOUS BUYERS ONLY**Over $400K BELOW CURRENT MARKET VALUE DUE TO NEEDED CORRECTIONS** PROPERTY SOLD COMPLETELY AS/IS****HURRY, OFFERS PRESENTED IMMEDIATELY AS THEY COME IN**"

Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/23/2009

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/22/2009

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I appreciated receiving this real estate letter from the William and Alexandra Lohr team out in the Warrenton office of Long and Foster.

"Palladium"

Palladium was selling for about $185 an ounce yesterday.

I wonder how much that makes these houses worth. They all apparently have "palladium" windows, according to a key word search on FranklyMLS.

Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/21/2009

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H/T Calculated Risk: "David Crowe of the National Association of Home Builders said he was quite negative in his housing and economic outlook last year, but not negative enough. ... Crowe said he expects prices to fall another 29 percent this year and new home sales to decline 14 percent. ... The nation has an excess "overhang" of 6.2 million homes for sale, about 1.5 million too many, he said".

Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/20/2009

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Northern Virginia Weekend Bits Bucket 1/17-1/18 2009

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/16/2009

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/15/2009

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In the News (H/T Tom): "Building on the Tax Base:
Construction, Prime Locations and Fewer Subprime Mortgages Push Arlington's Overall Assessments Up Despite a Slumping Economy".

Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/14/2009

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/13/2009

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At the Rappahannock Homes Blog: Warrenton Foreclosure Sale. The standout to me on this one is the difference between the bank's asking price in September and the final sales price.

Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/12/2009

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Inauguration and Depression Pain our Gain

Apparently. Hotels are definitely going to burst next week. I'd be surprised if there were any vacancies within a 60-mile radius.

Also from AP: I have been pondering this same probability -- I thought Virginia's budget problems might be helped by an uptick in lottery sales. "In Washington, D.C., instant sales reached a record of $45 million in the 2008 fiscal year, representing an 11 percent year-over-year increase."

Northern Virginia December Housing Sales

December sales were at a 10-year low for that month in Arlington County, with the median price falling about 11%. Sales were up (again) significantly in Prince William County (144%). Prince William has shaved its months of supply down to 4 months' from 15 months' worth last year, which is remarkable. The median price of those sales was $165,000, which is about the same price as buyers were paying between 2000-2001. Another county with a poor showing was Fauquier, with sales at a decade low, and an inventory supply of 12 months', despite the median price dropping 37%. That wasn't the case with other exurban counties like Culpeper (sales +126% and Stafford (sales +114%).



Source: MRIS

Northern Virginia Weekend Bits Bucket 1/10-1/11 2009

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/9/2009

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/8/2009

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"Waiting for Dodd"

"Waiting for Dodd"

To Praise or Blame or Neither

According to this article in the Gainesville Times, Prince William County expects that its fallout won't be as bad as other "surrounding counties" due to prior belt-tightening and better preparedness. Board of County Supervisor Chairman Corey Stewart (R-at large) is even promising an 18-percent drop in property taxes for Prince William County's homeowners.

But speaking of "surrounding counties," a.k.a. Fairfax, I thought this worth mulling over -- a disclaimer in an endorsement from News Messenger Editorial found on Gerry Connolly's congressional campaign's website:

"The projected shortfall of revenue is a result of the same financial mess the rest of the country is in. Fairfax County is not the only jurisdiction seeing that not as much money is pouring into local governmental coffers — Connolly is not to blame".

Connolly apparently had a pretty good day on his first day in the House of Representatives. He's especially pleased about being on the committee that regulates federal contracts, given his constituency.

Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/7/2009

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/6/2009

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/5/2009

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An Arlington townhouse (scroll to the bottom of the page) will be part of an upcoming federal auction -- hattip MM, and to Ace for ferreting out a related article (in the Weekend Bits Bucket comments). It appears the prior owner had $2.1 million in cash in the house, and Jeff B was wondering if there are any other hidden "seller subsidies" in the walls!

I'm sure they were just avoiding banks out of prudence . . .

Northern Virginia Weekend Bits Bucket 1/3-1/4 2009

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In the news: Annandale man sentenced for mortgage fraud

Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 1/2/2009

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