Last week's report by the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, which said home prices fell 3.1% in the first quarter, the largest drop in its 17-year history and only the second quarter of price declines recorded.
The OFHEO index is narrower in scope and is calculated using mortgages of $417,000 or less that are bought or backed by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac. That excludes properties bought with some of the riskier types of home loans.
| City | Past quarter | Past year | Past 5 years |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Stockton, Calif. |
-8.66% |
-21.51% |
32.11% |
|
Modesto, Calif. |
-8.46% |
-20.96% |
35.39% |
|
Merced, Calif. |
-7.93% |
-24.68% |
35.78% |
|
Naples-Marco Island, Fla. |
-7.76% |
-18.67% |
60.55% |
|
Bakersfield, Calif. |
-7.14% |
-14.89% |
78.53% |
|
Yuba City, Calif. |
-6.88% |
-16.53% |
43.78% |
|
Las Vegas-Paradise, Nev. |
-6.83% |
-12.06% |
65.11% |
|
Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, Calif. |
-6.8% |
-13.82% |
71.46% |
|
Bradenton-Sarasota-Venice, Fla. |
-6.49% |
-16.72% |
48.32% |
|
Cape Coral-Fort Myers, Fla. |
-6.14% |
-17.45% |
52.08% |
No one put a gun to Bear Stearn’s collective head and made them spread risk ineffectively and invest in sketchy sub-prime mortgage securities. They did it all by themselves. Yet here we see a government-backed takeover to shore up confidence in a financial system that seems unable to take care of itself. Laissez-faire? Quite the opposite, it appears. What kind of message does this send to other financial institutions? Can they now expect similar access to the “discount window†that had been reserved for institutions that work with taxpayers, not investors?
San Diego Brokers