American builders face slump in sexiness of new homes for sale

photo credit: sscornelius

Well, why splash out $200,000 a piece on new homes when a) you probably can’t get a mortgage and b) if you could you might just buy one of America’s vastly discounted foreclosed homes.

New figures show US buyers are getting turned off when it comes to freshly-built property. The country’s Department of Housing and Urban Development said new residential sales in August were 34.5 per cent down on the same month last year.

Foreclosed homes = cheap property

This isn’t necessarily bad news for budding property investment professionals, as the current market in many western countries is arguably more welcoming to speculator virgins than it’s ever been. In America a wave of foreclosed homes means cheap property is available nearly everywhere, new builds are going down in price and in the UK an overall price correction continues. All this means anyone who already has the finance could potentially grab a bargain and come out unscathed, particularly as an imminent bailout of the US financial system could spark a slow recovery process.

UK downturn sparks discount sale

The UK’s downturn has seen some developers falling over each other to offer discounts to buyers – some are offering wine tasting evenings just to get punters through the shiny new doors. Other have bettered the government’s scrapping of stamp duty by offering to pay it for buyers of new homes which are too expensive to fall within the concession. It’s a discount free-for-all that those who can afford could take advantage of. New homes for sale now at $200,000 might next year be worth £190,000 or less (note the might), but in six years could be topping more than $300,000. It’s not for everyone, but those willing to take the chance might find the current cloud has an eventual silver lining.

[tags]real estate,real estate investing,property,property investment[/tags]