Where Home Prices Crashed Early, Signs of a Rebound

Optimistic article in today's New York Times. The reporter, David Streitfeld, reports from Sacramento, California, one of the first cities to be terrorized by the real estate market. Streitfeld talks about investors and first-time buyers out in force, competing for bargain-price foreclosures. That is typically the first sign of a rebound (or at least bottom) in the market.

He talks about signs of progress in other hard hit cities. Las Vegas' homes sales, for example, were up 35% this March from last month.

As Streitfeld writes, "Hope for housing was on full display in the stock market on Monday. News that pending home sales rose in March instead of falling, coupled with improved construction spending, propelled a strong rally. One broad market average, the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index, is now in positive territory for the year, after being down 25 percent on March 9."

And in Philadelphia, we have been seeing an increase in investors and even more so first-time homebuyers for awhile now. Another example of how our real estate market was hit a lot less harder than others and is well-positioned to rebound much faster than others.