The following statistics were gleaned from a Yahoo Finance article detailing the real problem faced by eight of the states hardest hit by the continuing recession. The bottom line is too few jobs, too many foreclosures, not enough home buyers, and no relief in sight. The Great Eight are: Michigan, Nevada, California, Oregon, Florida, Arizona, Georgia, Illinois. Not to pick on any one state in particular, but let’s look at Florida, land of sunshine and the eternal American beach vacation.
Right now the Sunshine State is mired in the midst of a 12% unemployment rate, fourth worst in the entire country, which equates to more than one million people out of work. 21% of housing units in Florida are empty and more than 5% of properties have been foreclosed upon, along with a 81% decrease in building permits. But how exactly do all these numbers work together? Where are the people living? Foreclosed families still have to lay their heads somewhere at night. If they can’t afford to rent, they sure can’t afford to buy, even with prices at rock bottom rates, so where are they? The three main choices are:
- Moved out of state in search of a better economy
- Living with relatives
- Homeless
And Florida is only a microcosm of what used to be thriving, populous pockets of America. With fearless leaders like, Ben Bernanke, claiming it might take ten years for the unemployment rate to return to a semblance of what used to be normal (6%), will newly christened ghost towns like Yuma, Arizona, and Flint, Michigan, ever recover? People are leaving and not looking back in Mr. Bernanke’s America.
The idea to keep in mind is that home prices are low across large swaths of markets, yet properties still sit, foreclosed and vacant, with little buyer interest. When times are tough, the first order of survival is food. Without that, little else matters. To get food requires a job. No jobs means no food. no wonder people aren’t too worried about whether or not they’ll be able to buy a house before the market recovers – they’re too busy worrying about when the unemployment checks will stop, and how long the food stamps benefits will last.
It might be a buyer’s market but there aren’t many left standing.
The Creating Wealth
Flickr / Phillip Pessar
