The sorry state of the United States housing market has become even clearer with a report released by housing data firm CoreLogic.
As reported here, the numbers show that about 11.1 million households, or about one in four (23.1 percent) of all mortgaged homes, were underwater in the October-December quarter. More people now owe more on their mortgages than what the property is actually worth.
What's going to make it worse is the rising price of oil. Writing in the Huffington Post, William Alden says that rising transport and heating costs will deter people from buying homes. Add to that the fact that it makes it even harder to pay off a loan. "Once you start to see gas prices get into the $4 range, that's going to have a downward effect on sales," said Bernard Baumohl, chief global economist at the Economic Outlook Group told Alden. "Home sales deteriorate probably exponentially after that."
The US economy cannot recover unless the housing market picks up. It looks like that's not going to happen any time soon.
no comment untill now