The Pace of Recovery will be Slower in Some States
In an article titled, “The 5 states where Housing will Recover First,” author Steve Kerch of MarketWatch lists the reasons why he believes that those states will be North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa, Nebraska and Oklahoma. The article also listed the five states where the author believes housing recovery will take much longer. He suggests that these states may be at the opposite end of the spectrum. Those states are Nevada, Michigan, California, Florida and Rhode Island.
Some factors that contributed to the inclusion of the recovering states were low mortgage delinquency rates, low unemployment and home price performance. The states that the author cited as most likely to lag in a recovery were assessed using factors such as high mortgage delinquency rates, high unemployment and home price declines.
California, with the third worst unemployment rate in the country and home price declines surpassing 40%, has a difficult road ahead. Only Michigan and Nevada have some numbers that look worse.
Foreclosures will Increase
Realtytrac says that this will be the biggest year for foreclosure, topping the one million mark. This blog is not in the business of bringing bad news to its readers, but facts are not always uplifting. This is all to point out that while the economy struggles to return from a great recession, there are still contributing factors that are slower to recover.
Retirement Savings Rebounding
In sharp contrast to all this doom and gloom is the stock market. The DOW sits at a 30-month high. That is good news for more than Wall Street types. Middle class people who have company-sponsored 401k plans or who have IRA’s with any exposure to the equities markets are seeing their balances increase. Seven straight weeks of gains as of this writing will provide some relief to those who invest in blue-chip stocks.
Leave a Reply