The Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University provides interesting state-wide real estate news to those who subscribe to their e-mailed newsletter. I found three of their articles in the latest newsletter of special interest.
DOTZOUR'S HEADLINES FROM THE FRONT LINES
COLLEGE STATION (Real Estate Center) - Chief Economist Dr. Mark Dotzour is crisscrossing the nation delivering his economic message and collecting valuable data for the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University.
Among the comments he heard this week at meetings of the National Association of Business Economics in Washington, D.C., were:
- "Clearly there is virtually no threat of inflation in the next two years."
- "There's virtually no chance of the Fed increasing interest rates (maybe a symbolic small move aside)."
- "The last recession, the Fed waited until unemployment was 5.5 percent before tightening."
- "We won't get to that level for several years."
- "The threat is for deflation across the globe, with the exception of China."
- "China's money supply is up 30 percent from last year. Our M3 (the Fed's measure of the money supply) is virtually unchanged from a year ago, and available credit is less than last year."
"The Congressional Budget Office said the United States is going to be unable to pay for the social contract with America," said Dotzour. "It's only a matter of when and how the adjustments for failed promises have to take place. Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security cannot be funded at current levels of spending."
WHOLE FOODS SELLS FROM PARK LANE
DALLAS (Dallas Morning News) - Whole Foods Market will open its biggest store in North Texas on Monday at the Park Lane development.
The Austin-based natural and organic grocer has created 350 jobs in its 64,000-sf store, which fronts Greenville Ave. It has also brought the retail occupancy at the one-year-old Park Lane project to 60 percent.
Two more North Texas Whole Foods Markets are under development. One site opens at the Village at Fairview in early fall, and a Tarrant County store is waiting for roads to be built. These will be the region's eighth and ninth Whole Foods Markets.
Park Lane is a 33.5-acre, $750 million mixed-use development that includes 750,000 sf of existing office space and 700,000 sf of retail, restaurant and entertainment space.
OUTSIDE BUYERS FINDING DEALS AT AUCTIONS
DALLAS (Dallas Morning News) - Nonlender buyers looking for a deal on a house are heading for the foreclosure auction, where they paid an average of 56 cents on the dollar for foreclosed homes in the Dallas-Fort Worth area in first quarter 2010, according to Foreclosure Listing Service.
Dallas County foreclosed homes sold to outside buyers at an even cheaper 48 percent of the appraised value, far less than the average 60 cents on the dollar paid in September 2008.
The average sale price of an auctioned home was $91,851 in the first quarter, compared with $103,629 in 2008.
Foreclosure Listing Service reports that about 6 percent of foreclosed homes are directly purchased at foreclosure auction and that out of 13,259 foreclosures filed in DFW during the first quarter, only 263 homes were sold.
BILL CHERRY, REALTORS
DALLAS
Our 45th Year
214 503-8563
Bill,
Dr. Dotzour and the entire staff at recenter do a fantastic job.
Interesting post and analysis. I do agree with the deflation part EXCPT on the level of fuel. There I think the prices are rigged so it cannot happen