Category Archives: Economy

Social Media Boom Fuels San Francisco’s Rental and Home Sales Market

Hard on the heels of my last post that covered sky-rocketing home prices and rents comes yesterday’s front-page New York Times article on how San Francisco is at the epicenter of the new social networking/media boom. Did you like this? Share … Continue reading

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Who to Believe? Case Shiller or Ken Rosen

Case Shiller may be talking about double dip but Ken Rosen sees a somewhat brighter future for San Francisco’s residential real estate market. Here’s the doom and gloom at the national level from the recently released Case Shiller Report for … Continue reading

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Double Dip — Again?

Woke up this morning to NPR announcing that new home sales were the lowest they’d been in 15 years.  The housing market is already in a double dip, with some additional price declines  on the horizon, though we’re near the … Continue reading

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A Chart is Worth 1000 Words

A couple of months ago (gasp!) I promised to post my favorite charts from the UC Berkeley Fisher School of Real Estate and Urban Economics’ symposium on the state of the market.   I then got swamped working on my own … Continue reading

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Is Buying a House a Good Investment?

Among the scions of the real estate industry presenting at the Fisher Conference (see my previous post) was none other than Frank Nothaft, Chief Economist and Vice President of Freddie Mac.  He had a doozy of a slide set.  Here’s … Continue reading

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Ken Rosen Says “Buy Now”

Just back from the Fisher Center for Real Estate and Urban Economic’s semi-annual symposium on all things real estate.  (FCREUE is the real estate department within UC Berkeley’s Haas Business School.) Ken Rosen is the Center’s oft-quoted co-chair and quietly … Continue reading

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Alphabet Soup Revisited: What Shape Will the Recovery Take?

Back in the still-uncertain days of September 09, every market pundit had his or her own letter for what shape the recovery would take. I blogged about Ben Bernanke‘s “U,” Liz Ann Sonders‘ “V,” and Nouriel Roubini‘s “W” here. Though … Continue reading

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Case-Shiller Sounds a Cautiously Positive Note

Last week, Case-Shiller released January data for its closely watched national housing index.  Nationally, things are looking up – well, make that flat.  And that’s good news. In the wonderfully backward language of the report, the index’s year over year … Continue reading

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Is Now a Good Time to Buy?

In an article entitled Great Time to Buy (Famous Last Words), last Sunday’s New York Times took a swipe at perennially optimistic real estate agents who have never seen a time that wasn’t a good time to buy a house.  … Continue reading

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The View From Space: 2010

The View from Space – 2010 Ken Rosen is a smart guy.  He’s the co-chair of the Fisher Center of Real Estate and Urban Economics at the Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley and the investment adviser of choice … Continue reading

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