6 Comment

• spinmasters November 4, 2015 at 9:06 am

  Inventory levels drop — “demand is hot hot hot!”
  Inventory levels rise — “Fortunately, more Texans are listing their homes on the market as prices have risen, possibly in expectation of rising interest rates in the future.”
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  Don’t wait, act now while supplies last! Call now, and receive a free t-shirt.
• PC Principal November 4, 2015 at 9:40 am

  Im going to go on my commonsense rant here: Why does Houston Housing Authority or any authority back down to community outrage in an area so dilapidated? Residents have never taken care of the infrastructure, 5th ward in particular is one of the few places in town that has shrunk in population since the early 2000s, and schools are awful because of years of shitty leadership from superintendents that don’t want outside help. The “Keep it the same because i was raised here” argument is horrible in an area known for low income, crime, and no economy. 5th ward is Houston’s Detroit. Years of the same bad leadership have caused this community to fall into disarray and chased every helping hand away. The only difference being is that Detroit can go bankrupt and install a proper government to get them out of the cellar. 5th ward will always be the lazy friend mooching off of the success of the surrounding Houston economy. You only keep them around because everyone else would call you a d*ck if you called them out on it. /rant
• joel November 4, 2015 at 10:48 am

  Loving the increase in listings and the price reductions are already about to meet my expectations which is positive. I’m now thinking we could definitely get down to 20% below peak when all is said and done. Equities have rallied impressively the past month, but there’s still little demand growth looking ahead so hoping we have a long stock market correction next year to really pull these housing prices back down to a long term stability curve based on wage growth. Is anyone still delusional enough to think interest rates are going up in the next 6 months? The natural interest rate is almost zero right now and with the dollar set to retain it’s strength as foreign markets battle other headwinds, raising interest rates would be seriously stupid at this point. If we actually cared about employment rates then we should probably be considering negative interest rates before increasing them.
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  OMG, those micro-unit prices are crazy. 700sqft condos starting at $375K, really? You can find 2000sqft condos with better location in midtown for that and not even all of those are going to sell. Six figures to buy a walk-in closet in Houston is not going to fly at this location. Maybe at montrose/westheimer, uptown or southampton, but that kind of money requires Rice students, not UH.
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  PC Principal, first of all this is about space for building new public housing. The city has no plans, interest, funding or the means to go in and revitalize the area whatsoever. You speak of residents not maintaining the infrastructure which I find quite odd. I’ve lived in Houston for over 33yrs and every single neighborhood I’ve lived in has depended on the city to maintain infrastructure and schools. Additionally, redevelopment means relocation, plain and simple…these people aren’t stupid. So let’s say the city does finally get around to creating better schools and infrastructure for the 5th ward to revitalize itself. Their wages obviously won’t be increasing to keep up with any increased housing costs & taxes and they’ll have to move to similarly dilapidated areas further out with even less job mobility. My question to you is, what motivation would these people have to ever let the area be revitalized if it’s just going to push them further out and reduce their access to quality jobs and wages?
• joel November 4, 2015 at 11:23 am

  …and of course I typed that up before seeing Yellen still intends on going off the deep end to raise the rate and jeopardize american jobs in Dec. To be fair, I think she’s blatantly lying and trying to sugar coat the economy just to prop up investor sentiment, but if rates do go up everyone should know that it will only be because the banks will have thrown enough money around DC since they want higher rates to increase their margins, not because the Fed has actually achieved any of their stated goals. Why someone would intentionally destroy american manufacturing jobs by raising rates too early with a strong dollar and foreign currencies falling all around us is beyond me.
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  On the positive side, will only help further to weaken stocks and help push down housing prices and if you can hold onto your job buying things from europe & japan online is going to get even better still.
• Bernard November 4, 2015 at 11:38 am

  Ivy Lofts. Great idea. Bad location. Likely to go BK.

  They spent $3 million on 61k SF of land, $49 per SF of dirt. They are building 550 units. The land cost is only $5,500/unit. If they built this in Midtown, Montrose, Uptown, or Downtown the units would sell for a huge premium over this location, EASILY covering the higher cost of a good site.

  Typical out of town developer.
• TheNiche November 4, 2015 at 11:30 pm

  Re: Ivy Condos. Have these investors seen the site? Have they done any research into the market? Are they dense? You can’t sell 300-square-foot condos on a completely random site southeast of downtown Houston for $119,000. That is an incredibly bad value proposition. Is this some kind of a scam?