What’s Really Happening in Real Estate
by ilene - December 30th, 2009 12:59 am
See also my recent interview with a real estate developer whose thoughts are similar to those expressed in Michael’s article below. - Ilene
What’s Really Happening in Real Estate
Courtesy of Michael Panzner at Financial Armageddon
My friend George Ure, publisher of Urban Survival (and a related blog of the same name), as well as the Peoplenomics subscription newsletter, has posted an eye-opening commentary, "Coping: With What No One Wants To Say" (excerpted below), detailing industry insiders’ perspectives on what is really happening in the real estate market.
While the news that things aren’t getting any better in CRE and RRE won’t be much of a surprise to those who’ve actually been paying attention, it would seem to represent further evidence that the "experts" and powers that be in Washington and on Wall Street (along with their enablers in the mainstream media) are either liars, fools, or crack addicts — or some combination of all three:
Every so often, a group of major real estate developers get together for a conference where folks try to look ahead. In order to protect my source, I won’t tell you which real estate/developer conference it was, but I’ve been given permission by my source to post this high-level view of what the people who put up real dough to develop properties are seeing. This is the info that I talked about with Jeff Rense on his radio program last night — Read it and weep:
"This week I attended the [serious players] fall conference. [serious players] is the top real estate industry group in the world. All the most senior people in the industry.
1. Not one expert was willing to predict what things will look like in 3 years other than they think it will be better.
2. One top economist said if you are a developer find another career for the next 3 years-there is nothing to do and it may be 5 years.
3. Recovery will be slow. Unemployment will not drop back to more normal levels until 2014. First they will bring back people on 4 day weeks to 5 days, then they will increase hours form the