Arn Cenedella

Let’s keep things in perspective

Many folks seem to be in a large degree of despair about the economy and the housing market.

Yes, things are a little rough right now – but we are nowhere near “the end of civilization or the world as we know it”.

We need to keep things in perspective.

Here is some historical data that may help do that:

Recession 1973-1975

21% inflation

Dow Jones down 45%

Recession 1981 – 1982

Prime rate 18.87%

Dow Jones down 24%

Recession 1990 – -1991

653 failed banks and savings & loans (none in 2008 and 2009)

Dow Jones down 21%

The Great Depression 1929 – 1939

Unemployment 25%

Dow Jones down 89%

We survived all of the above!

Here is some more data:

30% of all homes are owned free and clear

96.7% of all homes with a mortgage are current on their payments

Housing affordability the highest it has been in 20 years

Please understand I am NOT saying “happy days are here again” or that our economy is going to turn up in the next month but I believe the media is far too negative on our current economic situation. I believe we will work our way out of this and in the next year or so will see real improvement in the economy and real estate market.

I do believe the current time does present opportunities for people to get into the real estate market where this would have been impossible 3 years ago.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 1st, 2009 at 3:34 pm and is filed under First-time home buyers, Inspiration. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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