"Why Housing Will Come Back"

"Finish each day and be done with it. 
You have done what you could; 
some blunders and absurdities have crept in; 
forget them as soon as you can. 
Tomorrow is a new day; 
you shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit 
to be encumbered with your old nonsense." 
Ralph Waldo Emerson

 

Matthew J. Festa, a Land Use Prof Blog editor and an Associate Professor of Law at the South Texas College of Law, reveals some light at the end of the real estate tunnel today when he breaks down an essay from the New Geographer blog by Joel Kotkin, a Distringuished Presidential Fellow at Chapman University in Orange, CA and an adjunct Fellow at the Legatum Institute in London, UK, into some of its essential elements. Mr. Kotkin's essay is entitled Why Housing Will Come Back, and here is a taste:

Yet for all the problems facing the housing market, homeownership – not exclusively single-family houses – is not likely to fade dramatically for the foreseeable future. The most compelling reason has to do with continued public preference for single-family homes, suburbs and the notion of owning a “piece” of the American dream. This is why that four out of every five homes built in America over the past few decades, notes urban historian Witold Rybczynski, have less to do with government policy than “with buyers’ preferences, that is, What People Want.”

(New Geographer, 14 September 2010, emphasis added.)

Mr. Festa's blog entry is entitled Kotkin: Why Housing Will Come Back.

Thanks to both Mr. Kotkin and Mr. Festa for helping to reorient us from what got us into this real estate mess and toward where we may be headed.  In the above-quoted words of Ralph Waldo Emerson: "Tomorrow is a new day; you shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense."

"We Still Hold These Truths"

In celebration of Constitution Day, September 17, I commend to you the wisdom of our Founding Fathers:

"It is up to your generation to become the army of liberation."

 

WeStillHoldTheseTruths.org

Under all is the Land

Under all is the land. Upon its wise utilization and widely allocated ownership depend the survival and growth of free institutions and of our civilization.

So begins the preamble to the Code of Ethics and Standards of Practice of the National Association of Realtors®.  This preamble, of course, is not a new statement of principle, but a restatement of one of the founding principles of the United States of America.

On June 12, 1776, the Virginia Constitutional Convention adopted the Virginia Declaration of Rights, written by George Mason, which begins with the statement:

That all men are by nature equally free and independent and have certain inherent rights, of which, when they enter into a state of society, they cannot, by any compact, deprive or divest their posterity; namely, the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety.

(Emphasis added.)   

The Virginia Declaration of Rights was drawn upon by Thomas Jefferson in his drafting the Declaration of Independence, and by James Madison in his drafting the Constitution and Bill of Rights (the first ten amendments to the Constitution).  

The danger of government interference with the free enjoyment of private property rights was, in other words, foreseen from the first moment of the founding of this Nation.  And, as I've posted recently on this site, the danger of public infringement of private property rights is growing.  

How far is your Supreme Court willing to go in standing up between you and your Government to protect your private property rights?  In response to this question, I recommend the excellent article by Ilya Somin, an Associate Professor at George Mason University School of Law, entitled Taking Rights Seriously? the Supreme Court and the "Poor Relation'"of Constitutional Law (PDF), and his more recent blog posting on the Supreme Court's decision in the case of Stop the Beach Renourishment v. Florida Department of Environmental Protection.  

Mr. Somin concludes that over the last 25 years, the Supreme Court has begun to take property rights more seriously. The unanswered and unanswerable question is whether this represents an evolution or a fleeting victory in the Court's protection of private property rights.  In any case, eternal vigilance is warranted.

Warning Regarding Residential "Short" Sales

Thanks to Real Estate Risk Management Specialist Kathy Mehringer for letting us know about a new California Department of Real Estate Consumer Alert entitled Warning Regarding Residential "Short" Sales (PDF).

Please download, read and save this Consumer Alert (PDF).

In Kathy's words, "you'll be glad you did."