The Dreaded Double Dip

Posted by Daniel Jones on Mar 6, 2011 5:09:00 PM

Home Prices: The Double-Dip is Near

By Les Christie, staff writer March 6, 2011: 5:02 PM ET


NEW YORK (CNN Money) -- That big sucking sound you heard last week? That was the air being taken out of the housing market by a slew of bad reports followed by some dire predictions by an industry bubble-spotter.

On Tuesday, we found out that home prices were near their post-bust lows. Two days later the government reported that January saw a double-digit dip in the number of new homes sold.

Then Robert Shiller, the Yale economist and co-founder of the S&P/Case-Shiller home price indexes, dropped this bomb: "There's a substantial risk of home prices falling another 15%, 20% or 25%," he said.

That's a stunning enough pronouncement to make house hunters consider putting purchases on hold. And that may not be a dumb move: If prices are near a double dip -- meaning they fell after the bust, rose a bit during recovery and are now heading back down -- there may be better deals ahead.

"There will be differences by market, but generally, you may get a big discount by waiting a year [to buy]," said Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, who thinks the price drop will be closer to 10% or 15%...

http://money.cnn.com/2011/03/03/real_estate/housing_buy_or_not/index.htm

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