Since residential real estate decisions are emotionally driven the bottom of the housing market is far from materializing, according to the outcome of a new Housing Predictor opinion poll. The survey found that more than 2 out of 3 respondents say the bottom of the housing market has not yet materialized in their city or town.
The online poll found that 69% believe the bottom of the market has not yet arrived. The other 31%, heavily influenced by residents in California, Michigan and Ohio who are seeing home values rise from their lowest levels said the bottom has already arrived in their communities.
Residential real estate sales are driven mainly by emotional decisions to buy a place to call home. As a consequence, since the state of psychology in people’s thinking processes are driven by emotions rather sound business judgments, the survey demonstrates that the bottom of the housing market is far from arriving. Since the large majority has the perception that the bottom of the market is not yet here, there are no indicators to believe that it will develop any time soon.
Government efforts to push the housing market out of its downturn are having an impact in many of the especially hard hit markets, including California, Florida, Ohio and Michigan, where home prices are on the rise after years of deflation.
A New Jersey based company is also working with financial institutions on a reward based program to pay under water homeowners to make their mortgage payments. The actions are all part of a major series of programs intended to produce a stabilization in housing markets.
The downturn in the market started more than four years ago in the hardest hit areas of the country with home values falling in every market that Housing Predictor tracks in all 50 states. Government incentives to drive markets to stabilize are slowly being withdrawn as the U.S. government eases its quantitative economic measures.
Do you feel your housing market has hit bottom?
Yes – 31% No – 69%
To see the previous poll results from 2010 click here.
To see poll archives from 2010 click here.