Since the Federal National Mortgage Association (Fannie Mae) began recording real estate data back in the early 1950's they have never recorded a year of national housing depreciation. When the National Association of Realtors (NAR) began their own market studies in 1968 they have found, on average, home values rise 6.7% annually with seven years of double digit appreciation.
After a ten year housing boom what we are now experiencing is not a "crash" (which according to the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight agency classifies as a 15% drop in home values over a 5 year span- much too early to talk about this) is a return to normalcy. In the NAR's 2007 3rd Quarter Metro Report they found that 97 out of 149 metro areas are yet experiencing year over appreciation with nine in the double digits. In 2006 Corvallis ranked a national record high of 17% appreciation; in 2007 we continued to appreciate at a respectable 5%.
With the stock market volitile, our government debt ratio at a four year low, unemployment at 5% and interest rates in the sub 6% range for qualified buyers on a 30 year fixed, now is a great time to move investments into the housing industry. For regular updates of the national and local real estate markets please go to my blog: http://www.activerain.com/mfullwiler
