Housing Vacancy Rate Hits New Record: Media Don't Notice

[Hannah Bell]

You would think that an industry that almost completely missed an $8 trillion housing bubble would be trying to do a better job in reporting on the housing market: But that does not appear to be the case.

The Census Bureau reported that the number of vacant units hit a new record high yesterday and it appears that no one noticed.

--Dean Baker

http://prospect.org/csnc/blogs/beat_the_press_archive?month=10&year=2009&base_name=housing_vacancy_rate_hits_new_1

Vacancy Rates Hit New Record

You probably heard it here first, but you shouldn't have. The rental vacancy rate jumped 0.5 percentage points in the third quarter, while the vacancy rate for ownership units edged up 0.1 percentage point. The long and short is that we have never had such a large glut of housing.

The folks in Congress are giving people $8,000 to increase the rental vacancy rate (i.e. buy a home). Of course this will lead to lower rents, which could cause other potential homeowners to rent rather than own. It may also cause some landlords to convert their rental units into condos. In other words, this is really silly housing market policy.

But hey, it's just $8,000 and it's not like we're giving it to families to pay for their kids' health care or food or anything.


- Dean Baker

[Festivito]

1. Time to move back home with mom and dad?

Not a time to buy a new car, keep the old one?

Yeah, youbetcha.

[sendero]

2. The "media"..

... i.e. the "fourth estate", the watchdogs, the folks that call them like they see them have been absent throughout this entire economic debacle.

Even now, most of the crap you will read in a newspaper about this mess is dancing around the edges of what really happened.

This is why I don't care if the NYTimes, the Globe, the Tribune, every last one of these propaganda-mongers folds up tomorrow - and thankfully many of them will.

[SpiralHawk]

3. The Republicon-owned corporate media borg does not serve Americans

It serves the Republicon Ruling Class O' Cronies, and serves them on bended knee with blow-dry hair.

[slipslidingaway]

4. knr nt