Sonny and Cher on the Housing Slump

And the beat goes on, the beat goes on;;
Housing Slump continues, going down;;
La da da da dee, la da da da da;;

Fannie Mae says it'll last so far.
Now's the time to listen to the big cigar.
Depression's hyperinflated, ya uh huh;
Time to reorganize like FDR;;

And the beat goes on.....

And Cheney wants to start another war;;
Televised with electric baseball scores;;

And the beat goes on.....

pix link: http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/V/htmlV/varietyprogr/varietyprogr.htm
sonny and cher

The San Francisco Chronicle, from the front page of its Business section, awakened its readers on Friday, October 19, 2007:

Home Sales in Bay Area Crash to 20-Year Low

County Number Sold Percent Change Median Price

Santa Clara 779 -39.0% $775,000
Alameda 565 -51.8% $599,500
Contra Costa 484 -55.8% $585,000
San Mateo 371 -37.0% $800,000
Sonoma 270 -37.2% $522,500
San Francisco 229 -30.4% $850,000
Solano 214 -52.2% $399,000
Marin 158 -24.4% $860,000
Napa 48 -49.5% $521,000
Bay Area 3,113 -44.8% $670,000

Figures are for sales of existing homes in 2007 compared with 2006 (A single year!) Now if you made an "investment" by buying a house you couldn't really afford, and then the price collapsed 40-percent, you would be up sh#ts creek too. And that's whether you had a fixed rate mortgage or a more exotic ARM or IO. People were convinced (brainwashed) that housing prices would go up forever, which by the way, is not necessarily a good thing!