Having worked in real estate in some capacity for the past 7 years, I have personally experienced the rollercoaster of how we got into this mess and it’s repercussions.  Living in places like Santa Barbara, CA., Scottsdale, AZ., and now Dallas, I have seen the whole spectrum of what an economic recession does to a local economy.  Growing up in Southern California has jaded my perspective a bit, it wasn’t until I moved to Scottsdale, AZ. that I had a more realistic view of housing prices and how the fluctuation in supply and demand affects the local economy.  In 2005, when pretty much anyone with a heartbeat could obtain a loan and everyone was a Realtor (or becoming licensed) it seemed that investing in Real Estate, whether you could afford to or not, was the right decision to make.  The “investors” that were smart and got in and out early did in fact make money and lots of it.  But as the old adage goes, everything that goes up must come down.  People got greedy.   Now the local economies in places like Scottsdale where the main industry has been construction are suffering, because there was this artificial surge in development that took only a few years to implode itself.  There’s something to be said for pacing growth and too much of a good thing.  Cities like Scottsdale will be among the last to recover from this recession since they have so much inventory that needs to be sold by fire (heaven forbid a desperate homeowner would do such a thing).  Dallas, on the other hand, has benefited from historically lower home prices, which have declined by 5% and a steady business climate.  Unemployment is currently at 8.6% which is well below the national number and although people have  gotten themselves into bad mortgages, they are fewer and further between compared to Scottsdale where the home prices have fallen up to 40%.

 

What this means to me is that although the country is in a recession, it is all relative and the extent of recession or resilience is very much in the eye of the beholder.