Taken from: WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- Supported by a tax credit, the pending home sales index rose a seasonally adjusted 5.3% in March, and was up 21.1% compared with a year earlier, the National Association of Realtors said Tuesday. In February, the index rose 8.3%, compared with an earlier estimate of an 8.2% gain. For March sales contracts rose 12.7% in the South, 1.9% in the West and 1.2% in the Midwest. Contracts declined 3.3% in the Northeast.
The Tax Credit is now gone and housing may slow but in time natural forces will start moving the market forward. Lawrence Yun of the NAR expects things to pick up second half of 2010. The housing market will indeed need time to recover and the recovery will be tied closely to jobs, the deficit, taxes and productivity in the U.S.
Thoughts on owning a home and investing in Real Estate:
1. The lesson to take from the housing collapse is not that real estate or home ownership is a bad investment but that buying and selling real estate should be taken seriously and should be done with knowledge and with preparation for long-term ownership.
2. It is a long-term investment that for many, over the long-term, has provided a wealth or higher standard of living they could not have achieved by working in their field.
3. Putting money in the bank as Warren Buffet stated, "is a poor investment". Some day inflation will return and real estate prices will go up- equity will be earned and those homeowners can then take that equity and invest it or use it to MOVE UP to a bigger home or one in a better location.
4. You need a place to live so this investment offers something most other investments do not offer- no matter what happens in the market, that property will still exist.
5. The majority of homeowners with a loan WERE RESPONSIBLE and needed no assistance.
6. If regulations better limit borrowers perhaps this will never happen again... if not.... we will see something like this down the road.
