Housing Starts Plunge, Producer Prices Shoot Up

[readmylips]

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. housing starts posted their steepest drop in more than 14 years in March, suggesting some cooling in the long-hot housing market, while producer prices rose steeply on surging energy costs.

Housing starts plunged 17.6 percent in March, their biggest drop since January 1991, to a 1.837 million unit rate from an upwardly revised 2.229 million unit pace in February, the Commerce Department said on Tuesday.


http://www.reuters.com/

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My house is 3 years old (AZ) and has gone up in price at least 300K. We paid 280K and now it's 650K. People knock on our door asking if our house is for sale, they want to buy it. A new house at 650K is a big house on a small lot and not an inch of landscaping or swimming pool. We do have a beautiful semi-custom home and we're not selling.

[Technowitch]

1. We don't have folks who come knocking...

...but our home has appreciated insanely in the eight years we've owned it. More than doubled. Fact is, even though we still have very good incomes, we literally couldn't afford to buy this place at its current price.

Thing is, the stock market as a whole really isn't moving. Bonds aren't paying much over inflation. That leaves real estate -- and with interest rates still relatively low, that's where all the money's going.

Unfortunately, this quickly prices folks out of the market...

[barb162]

2. most areas of the country aren't seeing this kind of increase; it

sure hasn't happened in my neighborhood!!!! I am not quite sure what to make of this new data. So many people bought the last few years, the market could be drying out because of that.

[phantom power]

3. Wow, that's exceptionally good, even for AZ.

Where do you live?