I was jolted back to reality this week rather quickly.
Foreclosure 2 doors down. Asking insanely low price of $240k (for smallest home). I don't mind. Last foreclosure so close asked $300k a bit ago and sold FAST. As long as it sells fast I am happy. We don't need a row of forelcosed homes on the street. Some in the greater neighborhood have been sitting empty for YEARS. I am curious which banks own those and which ones are acting so fast. Kudos to the banks owning near MY house!
So, we'll see.
$240k is just about prices when we bought. Still $10k higher. Still have equity equity. YEah, not for long!
Also, lay offs seem to be contagious around here all of a sudden.
I don't know how it is in other regions, but Cali has been hit HARD this decade. Most of our friends and family had lay offs in 2002 with the tech bust. MANY of them had lay offs again in 2005. & of course the same people are being laid off again now (a lot of lay offs last week I guess). I mentioned before the housing bubble was not ALL about greed. I know a lot of people used their equity to get by layoff after layoff. Not sure what there plan of actions is this time. It is scary when it comes to the foreclosures. It's BAD but everyone laid off can only make it worse. Since the people who can afford their mortgages won't be able to if they are out of work for a long time.
It's pretty scary out there. Just wondering if our slice of suburbia will become a foreclosure wasteland...
---------------------------------
P.S. I am closing all my old credit cards and my FICO will still be over 800. How do I know? Because I always close my old credit cards (My oldest card I have only had about 3 years though I have used cards for 15+ years) and my score is just about always over 800. & if it dips down to like 790, well, I could care less. This whole fear of FICO strikes me as completely ridiculous most of the time. Fair enough if you are working on improving a low score. BUT if your score is already 780 or 800, I think you have way more important things to worry about!
What do I know? My score has mostly been 800+ for my entire adulthood.
I did obliterate my score a bit (down to 750, which is the same as 830 to most lenders BTW). Anyway, with all the balance transfers. & then I paid them off, closed the cards, and my score went right back up (to 805 as of Jan. 1).
I am not too worried about it. !
Anyway, if I read one more article or comment how I shouldn't close my old cards. Egads!!!!!
Back to Reality
January 27th, 2009 at 08:44 pm
January 27th, 2009 at 09:15 pm 1233090902
January 27th, 2009 at 11:08 pm 1233097697
January 28th, 2009 at 01:13 am 1233105187
January 28th, 2009 at 03:51 am 1233114670
I was just saying in the forums, median house price here is 33% of Bay Area. It always has been (since we have lived here about 7 years, anyway).