Here are the pros and cons.

Pros:

1. Selection of available properties (inventory) is up.

2. Interest rates are low

3. Many properties now make economic sense – that is, incomes are greater than expenses

4. Current prices favor long term appreciation and equity creation through mortgage reduction

5. Sellers are becoming more realistic about market prices

Cons:

1. Prices (values) are still falling in many markets. This is spooking cash buyers.

2. Uncertainty in credit markets

3. Commercial properties are finding refinancing basically unavailable at reasonable costs

4. Occupancy rates continuing to fall during our jobless recovery

5. Difficult workout situations on commercial properties becoming more common.

There; glad I was able to clear that up for you so you could see the logical answer!

Pssst! Hey buddy….want to buy some REIT stocks? Look at these dividends!

Everyone is doing their predictions for this year; so not to be left out, here are mine for the 2010 Denver Real Estate market.

1. There will still be high volatility.

2. Government intervention (“help”) has only brought future sales forward and will now contribute to future weakness.

3. Mortgage rates will rise to 6%

4. “Dark Inventory” will hit the market and keep prices from going up significantly.

5. Many private (small) mortgage brokers will be pushed out by increased government paperwork (bureaucracy) and large banks.

6. Unless something is done to bring jumbo loan rates closer to conventional (conforming) rates, sales of homes in the upper price points will languish.

7. We will wait for “the other shoe to drop” in the commercial markets as building owners and developers try to restructure (with limited success) their loans.

8. High unemployment will keep a lid on future demand nationwide. Denver, with its better employment situation, will be affected less by this one.

Sorry. Wish I could be more optimistic. But until the bureaucratic pinheads in Washington quit meddling and “fixing” things…..the overall housing market will not be able to pull us out of this recession.

Glad the Denver economy is improving and that we don’t have it as bad as many markets in the country.

Denver had a record drop in sales of existing homes in 2009. But inventory has declined considerably and prices have stabilized or even gone up slightly in some markets.

Metrolist data released Thursday that sales of existing homes had dropped 12% - a new record. The biggest percentage drop previously was a 4 percent decline from 2007 to 2008.

The Median price of homes sold was about the same at $219,000.

I expect the sales decline to continue sales of homes above the $600,000 price point will continue to be sluggish until people start to feel more secure with their jobs.

It could be worse if Colorado’s job market wasn’t doing fairly well. Colorado’s unemployment rate hovered around 7 percent in 2009, while the national rate was about 10 percent.

Metro Denver ended 2009 with 16,456 unsold homes on the market, a 16% improvement over a year ago.

On a bright note, Metro Denver home prices ranked at the top of the most recent Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller Home Price Index.