I’m a realist 1st. An optimist 2nd. A pessimist 3rd. This is clearly rooted in my 3rd. I feel it does affect Steamboat’s real estate, but not as much as other parts of the country.

Click here to view The Economist article

Double-dip drama
Feeble figures fuel fears
Jun 24th 2010 | Washington, dc

“MORE than the European debt crisis is keeping American economic policymakers awake at night just now. Despite a year of government effort, a tentative recovery in the housing market appears to be on the verge of stalling.

Home prices have now fallen for the past six months, according to the Case-Shiller home-price index, after rising from their nadir for the five months before that. (Another index, from the Federal Housing Finance Agency, has, however, shown a slight uptick in March and April.) As for sales volumes, last September home sales soared in anticipation of the planned expiry of a government housing-tax credit, only to tumble thereafter, despite the extension of the deadline to April this year. As the new deadline approached sales duly climbed again. But the latest data show that even before the credit window closed, fewer sales were going through (see chart). Sales of new homes fell 33% from April to May, nearly the worst performance since the bust began.