Did you catch the 60 minutes piece on the sub-prime mess? They featured Stockton, CA's market which is going down faster than it went up in an article called, "House of Cards, The Mortgage Mess" http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/01/25/60minutes/main3752515.shtml . It's a great piece about simple economics, supply and demand. It also reiterates my opinion that all real estate is local and here on good old Cape Cod there is a very limited amount of land available to create a new supply of homes. With less supply available than over built areas like Stockton, CA, Florida, and Nevada the home price values will not go on such a downward spiral.

Supply of Cape Cod homes for sale have increased as a result of the national home crisis. A lot of it has to do with mortgage companies providing sub-prime loans or giving loans with very little down or no money down to people assuming their home values would always go up. Other home owners took their equity out of their primary homes to use as a down payment on a 2nd or 3rd home and now are being squeezed.

So how does Cape Cod match up to Stockton, CA. Well, 1st of all the sales volume hasn't gone down as much, a drop of 1.9% since 2006, and the average sales price has actually increased 2.8% since 2006. See my article for 2008 predictions at http://www.sandbarhomes.com/whatsnew/forecast2008.html.

In summary, Stockton, CA holds the Ace of Spades (bad news) and Cape Cod holds the Ace of Clubs (wealth and fame). Real estate always goes through a cycle this current buyer's market gives you a great opportunity to buy a nice vacation home on Cape Cod that you can live in and enjoy for many summers to come.