United States housing prices experienced a major market correction after the housing bubble that peaked in early 2006. Prices of real estate then adjusted downwards in late 2006, causing a loss of market liquidity and subprime defaults.
A real estate bubble is a type of economic bubble that occurs periodically in local, regional, national or global real estate markets. A housing bubble is characterized by rapid and sustained increases in the price of real property, such as housing' usually due to some combination of over-confidence and emotion, fraud, the synthetic offloading of risk using mortgage-backed securities, the ability to repackage conforming debt via government-sponsored enterprises, public and central bank policy availability of credit, and speculation. Housing bubbles tend to distort valuations upward relative to historic, sustainable, and statistical norms as described by economists Karl Case and Robert Shiller in their book, Irrational Exuberance. As early as 2003 Shiller questioned whether or not there was, "a bubble in the housing market" that might in the near future correct.
Timeline
Market correction predictions
Based on the historic trends in valuations of U.S. housing, many economists and business writers predicted a market correction, ranging from a few percentage points, to 50% or more from peak values in some markets, and, although this cooling did not affect all areas of the United States, some warned that the correction could and would be "nasty" and "severe".
Chief economist Mark Zandi of the research firm Moody's Economy.com predicted a crash of double-digit depreciation in some U.S. cities by 2007–2009. Dean Baker of the Center for Economic and Policy Research was the first economist to identify the housing bubble, in a report in the summer of 2002. Investor Peter Schiff acquired fame in a series of TV appearances where he opposed a multitude of financial experts and claimed that a bust was to come.
The housing bubble was partly subsidized by government-sponsored entities like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and federal policies intended to make housing affordable for all.
Market weakness, 2005–06
The booming housing market halted abruptly in many parts of the United States in the late summer of 2005, and as of summer 2006, several markets faced ballooning inventories, falling prices, and sharply reduced sales volumes. In August 2006, Barron's magazine warned, "a housing crisis approaches", and noted that the median price of new homes had dropped almost 3% since January 2006, that new-home inventories hit a record in April and remained near all-time highs, that existing-home inventories were 39% higher than they were just one year earlier, and that sales were down more than 10%, and predicted that "the national median price of housing will probably fall by close to 30% in the next three years ... simple reversion to the mean."
In Boston, year-over-year prices dropped, sales fell, inventory increased, foreclosures were up, and the correction in Massachusetts was called a "hard landing" in 2005. The previously booming housing markets in Washington, D.C., San Diego, California, Phoenix, Arizona, and other cities stalled as well in 2005.
Fortune magazine in May 2006 labeled many previously strong housing markets as "Dead Zones"; other areas were classified as "Danger Zones" and "Safe Havens". Fortune in August 2005 also dispelled "four myths about the future of home prices".
The Arizona Regional Multiple Listing Service (ARMLS) showed that in summer 2006, the for-sale housing inventory in Phoenix had grown to over 50,000 homes, of which nearly half were vacant (see graphic). Several home builders revised their forecasts sharply downward during the summer of 2006, e.g., D.R. Horton cut its yearly earnings forecast by one-third in July 2006, the value of luxury home builder Toll Brothers' stock fell 50% between August 2005 and August 2006, and the Dow Jones U.S. Home Construction Index was down over 40% as of mid-August 2006.
CEO Robert Toll of Toll Brothers explained, "builders that built speculative homes are trying to move them by offering large incentives and discounts; and some buyers are canceling contracts for homes already being built". Homebuilder Kara Homes announced on 13 September 2006 the "two most profitable quarters in the history of our company", yet the company filed for bankruptcy protection less than one month later on 6 October. Six months later on 10 April 2007, Kara Homes sold unfinished developments, causing prospective buyers from the previous year to lose deposits, some of whom put down more than $100,000 (~$ in ).