Across the Washington region and around the country, the expectations of buyers and sellers are out of whack, thwarting deals that could potentially lift the U.S. housing sector from its long funk. The nascent rebirth of the market earlier this year proved to be a mirage.
Despite record-low interest rates, many would-be buyers are retrenching, hamstrung by meager growth in their wages, gripped by fears over the possibility of losing their jobs or another recession. Sales of existing homes plunged in July to the lowest level in more than a decade, and sales of new homes were slower than at any time since the government started tracking the data in 1963. The results were far worse than some of the most pessimistic economists had expected and added to the doubts nagging at Wright and other prospective buyers, even in areas such as Washington that have been relatively insulated from the housing bust.
There are now so many homes for sale, and so few of them are selling that, at the current sales pace, it would take over a year to clear the existing inventory on the U.S. market. That is more than double the time required in a healthy market and up significantly just since June
Full story: In struggling housing market, buyers and sellers are out of sync