Tranzon Auction Properties - Real Estate Auction Blog

Your very own blogger was quoted in the most recent CoStar Watch List

Taking Our Global Medicine

The level of thoughtfulness, intelligence and market insight of Watch List readers and the chance to receive and share that knowledge has been one of the primary motivators behind this column and for which I am entirely humbled and grateful. This past week has been a prime example of that.

The Federal Reserve Board’s actions in January lowering key interest rates 1-1/4 points over the span of two weeks prompted several e-mails. Readers are suggesting that while the Fed cuts may have buoyed short-term hopes, they won’t be enough to keep real estate markets from sinking further. The problems that need to be addressed are no longer just about money and have overflowed out of the U.S. pool and are spread out across the globe…

…What is happening in Vegas is being mirrored elsewhere in the country.

“Our phones just started ringing again with earnest. It is almost like the Northeast has come out of the deep freeze and stopped shivering enough to dial the phone,” writes Mike B. Carey, national account coordinator for Tranzon Auction Properties in the Portland, ME, office. “Buyers are once again aggressively chasing Class A and B locations. Class C and single-family residential is still struggling to attract the interest it did two years ago as the speculators have either smartened up or been wiped out (more of the latter, than the former). All in all the conversations I have been having with clients and buyers over the last two weeks indicate a bit more optimism, cautious as it may be, about the real estate market in general. That said, buyers are still very conservative and are unwilling to push the pricing envelope assuming the markets are either stagnant or still receding.”

It’s the caveats that Kingham, Law and Carey hint at that other readers addressed head on. The optimists are assuming that there is a spread in risk, which there is not, writes Dr. John Doede, a doctor of chemistry and physics and a “semi-retired private investor” in Phoenix, AZ,… Click Here for Full Article