Homeowners in U.S. Lost $5.9 Trillion Since 2006 as Defaults Cut Values

[Purveyor]

Dec. 9 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. homeowners have lost about $5.9 trillion in value since the housing market’s peak in March 2006 as mounting foreclosures and the recession weighed on prices, according to Zillow.com.

Almost half a trillion dollars was wiped out this year through November as housing headed for a third straight annual decline. New foreclosures and higher mortgage rates in 2010 may hinder a rebound, the property data service said today in a statement.

“A phenomenal amount of wealth has been erased since the housing bust,” Stan Humphries, chief economist for Seattle- based Zillow, said yesterday in an interview. “For many households, most of their wealth is tied up in real estate.”

The net worth of U.S. households at the end of June fell 19 percent from two years earlier to $53.1 trillion, according to Federal Reserve data. Employers have cut more than 7.2 million jobs since the start of the recession in December 2007. Unemployment was 10 percent in November as payrolls declined by 11,000, the Labor Department said last week.

LaVonna Gottschall paid $260,000 for her Merced, California, home in September 2007. She put down more than half the price and financed the rest with a 30-year fixed loan. Today, houses in her neighborhood are worth 59 percent less, according to Zillow.

“I almost wiped out all my savings,” Gottschall, 64, a retired insurance-company clerical worker, said yesterday in an interview. “I did the right thing. I didn’t get in over my head. Now I’m living month-to-month.”

MORE...

BLOOMBERG: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20603037&sid=af9OWXW1MJ6k

[Romulox]

1. Just as a thought experiment...how much taxpayer money have banks gained in this same time frame?

Interesting that (primarily foreign) banks losses to speculation were a national emergency.

Homeowner's losses? Not so much.

[notadmblnd]

3. enough to pay off every mortgage in the US

[jdlh8894]

4. BS!!!! n/t

[notadmblnd]

6. Oh.. you caught me... It's only ninety percent of all mortages in the US

U.S. Taxpayers Risk $9.7 Trillion on Bailout Programs (Update1)

By Mark Pittman and Bob Ivry

Feb. 9 (Bloomberg) -- The stimulus package the U.S. Congress is completing would raise the government’s commitment to solving the financial crisis to $9.7 trillion, enough to pay off more than 90 percent of the nation’s home mortgages.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=washingtonstory&sid=aGq2B3XeGKok

Now, provide me with a link for your argument if you can.

I didn't think so....



I love shoving the truth down the throats of the Right wingers

[notadmblnd]

7. when you call bullshit

you should at least provide evidence for your argument.

[Lance_Boyle]

2. A house is not "savings."

I don't get Gottschall's complaint. She paid a price she was comfortable with for a house she wanted. If she wanted SAVINGS, she might have considered SAVING some of the >50% of the house price that she put down. She didn't want savings, she wanted that house and she bought it. She has her cake, and wants a pie, too.

[SoCalDem]

5. Big Pharma & Med Ins Co, Inc, etc, esq..lahdidah, eieio,must be pissed as all get out..

The "plan" was for Boomers to sell those appreciated houses, so they would have the moolah necessary for all those pills and for that health care as they aged....and now Boomers will enter their Golden Years, broke, angry, overweight, sick and of 'not much use" to the money-grubbing "health " industry..

Most Boomers did not even HAVE pensions, and their "101-k"s got looted, and then their houses were devalued to the point that many are just saying.. take my house, please, and walking away.. As they age, their job situations get bleaker too...

It's gonna get UGLY!