Standard Pacific: "Buyer be where?"
Incredible article in this weekend's LA Times about Standard Pacific's "Mission: Possible" sale in Southern California.
For days, the Irvine company has been touting its "Mission: Possible" extravaganza in 49 communities throughout Southern California, with bonuses for buyers totaling as much as $20 million. Standard Pacific is aiming to sell 200 homes by offering mortgage loans with rates of less than 6% and other perks, including a free 42-inch plasma-screen television with every home purchase.Bubble Markets Inventory Tracking checked out the StanPac community "Avaron at Del Sur."
But in Victorville on Friday, the blowout looked more like a washout. Only a trickle of potential buyers showed up on the first day of the 10-day event.
Only a handful of prospects, although more than usual for a Friday, stopped by the sales offices of neighboring communities Diamond Ridge and Crystal Spring, which were decorated with colorful banners and posters proclaiming the event.
StanPac has lowered prices by 10-20% since spring 2007, and evidently that is failing to sell houses.
By the way, if we are "near the bottom" of the housing market, as people keep saying, then why are builders trying to dump inventory?
Posts
1 comment:
By the way, if we are "near the bottom" of the housing market, as people keep saying, then why are builders trying to dump inventory?
Only industry hacks and fellow travelers are saying that. Most potential buyers -- and there are a LOT fewer of them now that subprime is practically dead -- know that a house bought now is likely to depreciate in the future. And this is true no matter how low the interest rate. The $64k question is: Can or will the Fed lower rates enough to get enough buyers back in to the market to avoid a reverse boom of asset deflation? Or is the supply/demand imbalance now so hopelessly lopsided that only a price crash will fix things?
eh
Post a Comment